Moscow has begun striking targets indiscriminately across Ukraine in response to Kyiv’s intensifying attacks on Russian territory, according to Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov, as the conflict increasingly takes aim at critical economic infrastructure on both sides.
Peskov said on September 13 that Russia had previously refrained from attacking targets indiscriminately but had changed its approach after Ukraine began targeting Russian economic and strategic infrastructure.
“The Russian Federation did not strike everything and anything,” Peskov told reporters. “It started doing so after the Ukrainians themselves opened Pandora’s box.”
The comments echoed a warning by President Vladimir Putin last month that Moscow would retaliate against Ukraine’s economic infrastructure after a series of Ukrainian strikes on Russian energy assets.
“(Ukraine) set out to damage our economy. What did it do? It opened this Pandora’s box itself. Expect a response targeting your most sensitive economic sectors,” Putin said on August 22.
The escalation has coincided with a sharp increase in Russian aerial attacks. Moscow has expanded its use of jet-powered attack drones, while Kyiv has faced sustained overnight strikes, including almost continuous attacks on the capital from late August into early September.
The campaign has raised concerns over the ability of Ukraine’s air defences and energy infrastructure to withstand another winter of sustained Russian bombardment.
Russia has systematically targeted Ukraine’s energy grid since the first year of the full-scale invasion, damaging power-generation and distribution infrastructure and contributing to repeated outages.
Ukraine has increasingly sought to impose costs on Russia in return, targeting oil refineries, fuel depots and other strategic infrastructure in an effort to constrain Moscow’s energy revenues and increase pressure on its economy.
The latest Russian assault brought the war closer to NATO territory, with strikes reported in Volyn Oblast near the Yahodyn–Dorohusk border crossing with Poland.
Russian drones damaged a gas station near the crossing and struck the locomotive of a Kyiv–Warsaw passenger train close to the Polish border, underscoring the growing risks to transport and commercial infrastructure serving Ukraine’s western supply routes.
Gas stations have also become an increasingly prominent target. At least four Russian strikes on fuel stations in Kyiv were reported over the preceding week.
Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko said on September 11 that the capital lacked the resources to construct shelters at every gas station and was facing shortages of weapons required to intercept Russian drones and missiles.
The attacks form part of a broader Russian campaign against fuel distribution and logistics. Drone strikes on gas stations have previously been concentrated in Kharkiv, Sumy and Zaporizhzhia regions, but the tactic has spread towards central Ukraine, with dozens of stations reportedly hit during the summer.
The expanding targeting of economic infrastructure marks a further shift in the war, with both sides increasingly seeking to undermine the systems that sustain the other’s military capacity and civilian economy.
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