Ukraine’s military has shared video of a naval drone strike on a Russian tanker, and its attacks near Russian-annexed Crimea have intensified after strikes on Russia’s land corridor to the peninsula. Ukraine says the latest efforts target maritime supply routes as part of a “logistics lockdown” aimed at choking off supplies and routes into and out of occupied Crimea.

Ukraine’s drone force commander Robert Brovdi, also known as Magyar, says at least 36 ships have been hit and set on fire over the past four days in the Sea of Azov. Most of the vessels are described as belonging to Russia’s “shadow fleet” of commercial oil tankers. The BBC notes that the exact number is unclear because some ships may have been hit more than once and not all strikes have been confirmed independently.

The article describes how it is common to see tankers loitering in the Sea of Azov off the north-eastern coast of occupied Crimea, partly because Kerch port has an onshore oil loading facility. It also cites BBC Verify’s satellite imagery analysis suggesting the number of tankers in the area reduced in the days after Kerch port was attacked last month.

Brovdi says he detailed strikes every day between 6 and 9 July. Russian regional governor Yuri Slyusar said that two empty tankers were attacked on Wednesday in Taganrog Bay, in the north-east corner of the Sea of Azov, and that they were still burning the next day. Brovdi says two earlier tankers attacked in the week each carried about 7,000 tons of fuel from the Taganrog area to Crimea. The article also references a satellite image showing a plume of smoke rising from a ship around 2.5 miles (4.2 km) off the Crimean coast.

Beyond tankers, the article says a passenger ferry called SKS One and a bulk carrier were attacked in Kerch port, based on images posted on social media. It adds that leaving the Sea of Azov does not necessarily mean safety from further drone strikes, noting Ukraine’s general staff released footage of a naval drone attack on a sanctioned tanker called Blue and that Ukraine said the incident occurred near Yalta, in occupied Crimea.

The tanker attacks are described as coinciding with continued strikes on Russian oil refineries, which the article says have contributed to widespread fuel shortages across Russia, including in Moscow and St Petersburg. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky argues that targeting oil refineries is a direct response to Russia’s strikes and frames the campaign as punishment for Russia’s war effort.

The article also includes commentary about the broader impact on Russia’s naval and logistical capabilities, saying the scale of drone attacks on maritime logistics appears to have intensified recently. It states that Brovdi claimed attacks on 12 tankers in one night from Wednesday into Thursday and that Russian pro-war sources did not dispute the details or the authenticity of the footage.