Ukraine pressed ahead with large-scale strikes on Russian oil facilities despite repeated objections from U.S. President Donald Trump.
Ukrainian drones struck energy infrastructure and other critical sites in St. Petersburg, including a terminal and fuel storage depots, early on the 18th, according to the Associated Press and Reuters.
St. Petersburg Governor Alexander Beglov said one person was killed and five were injured in the drone attack. He said city authorities were putting out fires at an oil terminal, fuel storage depots and an industrial warehouse.
Beglov also said 12 apartment buildings and two houses were damaged.
Russia's state-run Tass news agency reported that the strike was among the largest Ukraine has carried out against the Leningrad region, including St. Petersburg, since the war began in 2022.
St. Petersburg is Russia's second-largest city and the hometown of President Vladimir Putin.
Alexander Drozdenko, governor of the Leningrad region surrounding St. Petersburg, said air defenses shot down 145 Ukrainian drones that day.
Ukraine also mounted large-scale attacks on Russian regions beyond St. Petersburg.
Russia's Defense Ministry said a total of 1,015 drones were downed across the country on the 18th, including 512 in the area around Moscow, the capital. Among the main targets were a data center operated by Russian social media company VKontakte, or VK, and a logistics warehouse belonging to e-commerce firm Ozon.
Tass, citing Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, reported that Russia was carrying out systematic, large-scale counterstrikes against Ukraine following the attack.
The strikes came as relations between Washington and Kyiv deteriorated rapidly. Trump agreed last week to a "diesel deal" with Russia and abruptly suspended sanctions on Moscow, a decision Ukraine strongly protested.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had said Russia was not halting attacks on Ukrainian energy facilities even after the energy ceasefire, and he signaled he would resume strikes on Russian sites despite Trump's pressure to stop hitting Russian refineries. On the 18th, Zelenskyy wrote on X, formerly Twitter, that Russia had deliberately attacked Ukrainian oil and gas facilities 76 times since the U.S. president announced the energy ceasefire a week earlier. Given that energy facilities are the main target of the attacks, he said, Russia is aiming to cause a massive blackout.
Trump, meanwhile, wrote on Truth Social that day that Zelenskyy does not want to end the war. When Zelenskyy criticized his diesel deal, Trump had said it was time for Ukraine to get new leadership.