ALMATY, Kazakhstan: Kazakhstan told Ukraine on Sunday to stop attacking an oil terminal on Russia’s coast, after the facility which handles around 80 percent of Kazakh oil exports shut following drone strikes.
Drones have targeted the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) terminal near the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk at least three times this year.
On Saturday, the sprawling export hub halted oil loading completely after naval drones damaged one of its three mooring points.
Ukraine has not claimed responsibility for the latest strike.
In a statement, Kazakhstan’s foreign ministry said Saturday’s attack, which forced the country to redirect supplies, risked undermining global energy security and harming bilateral relations.
“This incident marks the third act of aggression against an exclusively civilian facility whose operation is safeguarded by norms of international law,” it said.
“We expect the Ukrainian side to take effective measures to prevent similar incidents in the future,” it added.
The Central Asian country’s oil exports through the CPC amounted to the equivalent of around six percent of its GDP and roughly a quarter of its budget revenues last year, according to the US-based Caspian Policy Center.
The CPC pipeline — which begins at Kazakhstan’s Tengiz oil field and ends at the terminal — is one of the world’s largest by volume, handling around one percent of global supplies.
The Ukrainian military has targeted Russian energy infrastructure throughout the war, attacks that it says are aimed at draining the country’s war chest and ability to fund the war.
