Overview

• The Russian defence ministry confirmed the strike on the Orlovka interconnector at Novosilske, casting the hit as a legitimate military action.
• President Zelenskiy condemned the attack as a deliberate, cynical attempt to undermine Ukraine’s heating season preparations.
• Operators have begun pumping out an estimated 0.4 million cubic metres of gas from the damaged station to prevent uncontrolled loss.
• The interconnector is a linchpin of the Transbalkan corridor, which channels Azerbaijani, Greek and Turkish LNG, Romanian pipeline gas and potentially Bulgarian offshore supplies into Ukraine.
• Successive Russian strikes have cut domestic production, intensifying Kyiv’s rush to diversify winter supplies with key transit agreements set to expire next year.