Ukraine war briefing: Crimea locks down as Putin acknowledges ‘huge stream’ of Ukrainian drones
Ukraine said its forces struck a railway bridge, a power plant and other infrastructure targets in Crimea. Ukraine’s special forces said their units, working with
Ukraine said its forces struck a railway bridge, a power plant and other infrastructure targets in Crimea. Ukraine’s special forces said their units, working with the resistance movement in Crimea, destroyed a rail bridge over the North Crimean canal near the village of Rozdolne. The military described the bridge as a key logistics route used to supply Russian forces in southern Ukraine and said drones began hitting the structure late Sunday to Monday, collapsing part of it. A second strike on Tuesday targeted railway repair equipment deployed at the bridge and its remaining sections. Mikhail Razvozhayev, the Russian-installed governor of Sevastopol in Crimea, announced “enforced temporary measures” including the closure of public transport at 10pm, and of large shops and cafes at 8pm, with street lighting also dimmed. Petrol stations had a day earlier been banned from selling fuel to non-government users. Riding mopeds and motorbikes at night was banned last week – the noise said to hinder defences against drones, with an official claiming “children taking night-time rides” have been lured into the treachery by Kyiv. Ukraine’s defence ministry said drones struck an oil storage depot at the Kerch thermal power plant in eastern Crimea, an electrical substation in the west, and a liquefied natural gas distribution station in Simferopol, the peninsula’s second-biggest city.
Parts of Crimea were without power on Tuesday, the area’s energy supplier said, seeking to blame “technical malfunctions”. Vladimir Putin made his first comments about Ukraine’s strikes disabling Russian strategic infrastructure. Ukrainian drones “coming in a huge stream” were meant to “destabilise” society, disrupting energy supplies and tourism, said the Russian president. He railed that “the entire west” was working for Kyiv. Putin called on the Russian government to take additional measures to offset the consequences from the strikes – continuing his approach of distancing himself from addressing the impact of his war at home. Russia’s deputy prime minister, Alexander Novak, told Putin on Tuesday that officials were considering suspending diesel fuel exports to protect the country’s motorists, adding to ongoing bans on the export of jet fuel and gasoline, according to the Tass news agency. Novak said scheduled maintenance at refineries had been postponed. “We are using reserves that were not previously tapped, and are also encouraging increased supplies of additional volumes to the domestic market.” Restrictions on fuel sales have come in across several regions of Russia. Crimea’s ministry of sport on Tuesday cancelled all sporting events, competitions, and training sessions for children through 1 September.
The BriefWire