The operation to attack the gas pipeline was supposed to be carried out late on Friday, according to a statement from the Ukrainian military intelligence service on Telegram. The operation was described as a serious blow to Russian military logistics, the Associated Press reports. Dnevnik was unable to independently verify the Ukrainian side's claim.

It was also reported that the units also hit the 400-kilometer Koltsevoy oil pipeline, which supplies the Russian army with gasoline, diesel and jet fuel from refineries in Ryazan, Nizhny Novgorod and Moscow.

As confirmed today by the Ukrainian military intelligence service, all three lines of the oil pipeline were destroyed last night in simultaneous explosions, and the attack itself took place in the Ramensky district of the Moscow region, rendering the entire system inoperative.

The pipeline had an annual capacity of up to 3 million tons of jet fuel, 2.8 million tons of diesel and 1.6 million tons of gasoline, the intelligence service added.

Our strikes had a greater effect than sanctions, said intelligence chief Kirill Budanov, criticizing international sanctions against Russia for its attack on Ukraine in February 2022.

Moscow is directing all its forces towards the capture of Pokrovsk

Meanwhile, the Russian Defense Ministry claims that its forces defeated a Ukrainian special forces unit that was hastily sent to the flashpoint of fighting on the eastern front, Pokrovsk, to prevent further Russian troops from advancing into the city.

Russia and Ukraine have been giving conflicting accounts of what is happening in Pokrovsk, a key Ukrainian stronghold in the eastern Donetsk region. Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed last week that his forces had surrounded the Ukrainian defenders of the city.

However, a spokesman for Ukraine's eastern forces, Hryhoriy Shapoval, told the Associated Press last week that the situation in Pokrovsk was difficult but under control. On Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledged that some Russian troops had entered the city, but insisted that Ukraine was pushing them out.

Kiev did not immediately respond to the latest claims from the Russian Defense Ministry. Zelensky said last week that Russia had deployed about 170,000 troops in the Donetsk region, where Pokrovsk is located, in a large-scale attempt to capture the city and achieve a major frontal victory.

Moscow's key goal since the start of the war has been to take over the entire Ukrainian industrial heartland - the Donbass, which consists of the eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk. Kiev still controls about a tenth of this coal-rich area.