Russian Fuel Disruptions Push Central Asia Into an Energy Crisis

Ukraine's sustained attacks on Russia's oil refineries immediately plunged Central Asian countries into energy chaos, highlighting years of short-term policy decisions that have left the region without a coordinated energy strategy and sufficient diversification to withstand major disruptions. Just this week, Ukrainian drones knocked the Omsk refinery -- one of Russia’s largest processing facilities, with an annual capacity of nearly 22 million tons of crude oil -- offline, forcing Central Asian governments, particularly Kyrgyzstan, into…