Two people from Russia’s Belgorod region, a mother and father, were killed in the “emergency” on the Crimean bridge and their daughter was injured, the region’s governor has said on Telegram.
“This morning we all started with information about the emergency that happened on the Crimean bridge. We all saw a video on the internet of a damaged car with Belgorod number plates,” Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote.
“The girl was injured, moderately injured … The hardest thing is that her parents died, dad and mom.”
Ukrainian officials have continued to hint at Kyiv’s involvement in the Kerch bridge attack.
A spokesman for Ukraine’s military intelligence department, Andriy Yusov, has said: “The peninsula is used by the Russians as a large logistical hub for moving forces and assets deep into the territory of Ukraine. Of course, any logistical problems are additional complications for the occupiers.”
AP reports that the Security Service of Ukraine has posted a redacted version of a popular lullaby, tweaked to say that the bridge “went to sleep again.”
It also released a statement saying “all details regarding the explosion will be announced after the victory”, the BBC reports.
A Crimean Tatar-led underground movement is already active behind Russian lines and hundreds of young Tatar men are ready to take up arms to liberate the occupied peninsula, a veteran community leader has said.
The Guardian’s world affairs editor Julian Borger reports.
Moving away from events on the Crimean bridge for now, Russia continued its assault on Kharkiv last night and air raid sirens sounded to warn people to take shelter. Loud explosions were heard in the central district on Sunday evening, just hours after one person was killed and four wounded in an earlier attack.
Officials from the Kremlin have now spoken. Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the following, without providing evidence to corroborate the claims:
Today’s attack on the Crimean bridge was carried out by the Kyiv regime. This regime is terrorist and has all the hallmarks of an international organized crime group.
Decisions are made by Ukrainian officials and the military with the direct participation of American and British intelligence agencies and politicians. The US and Britain are in charge of a terrorist state structure.
A senior Russian politician has said that Russia should not renew the Black Sea grain deal in light of the attack on the bridge.
Sergei Mironov, leader of the A Just Russia party in Russia’s parliament, also said that Moscow should respond by destroying Ukrainian infrastructure, according to Reuters.
“That is what we need to do, and not discuss a grain deal that helps Kyiv’s rulers and their western masters line their pockets. There can be no grain deal after another terrorist attack,” he said on Telegram.
Russia agreed a year ago to sign the Black Sea grain deal which allowed Ukraine to resume shipping food from its southern ports despite the war. But it has repeatedly cast doubt on whether it will agreed to extend the arrangement, which – incidentally – expires today.
The Kremlin has yet to comment on the Crimean bridge incident or its possible implications for the grain deal. But state media is now reporting that Russia’s anti-terrorist committee has said Ukrainian “special forces” attacked the Crimean bridge overnight using unmanned drones on the water surface.
At least two other Ukrainian media outlets have cited unnamed sources which have said Ukraine’s domestic security agency and navy were behind the incident.
Ukrainian public broadcaster Suspilne and media outlet Ukrainska Pravda gave few details of an operation they said had involved the security service of Ukraine and the navy, but Suspilne cited its sources as saying the bridge was attacked with underwater drones, according to Reuters.
Suspilne quoted a navy spokesperson as saying he had no such information and urging the broadcaster to wait for official announcements.
The Russian-installed head of Crimea’s parliament has claimed that Ukraine was behind the incident on the Crimea bridge which killed two people earlier, the state RIA news agency reported.
Vladimir Konstantinov was quoted as saying that the bridge had been attacked by what he called Ukraine’s “terrorist regime” and that the railway part of the bridge was not damaged. In comments published by Russian media, he alleged Ukraine had committed a “new crime” by targeting a “civilian” facility.
Meanwhile, the BBC reports that a Ukraine security service source has told the broadcaster that the attack was “a special operation of the naval forces of the armed forces of Ukraine and the security service of Ukraine”.
“The bridge was attacked with surface drones. It was difficult to reach the bridge, but in the end it was possible,” the source says.
The Ukrainian site censor.net is also reporting that Ukraine’s domestic security agency was behind the attack, citing security service sources. It also states that the organisation head, Vasyl Malyuk, previously said the bridge was a legitimate target.
The Russian independent online newspaper The Insider has published a video showing the damage done to the bridge earlier today.
One section of the carriage way has buckled. There is no vehicle traffic in either direction. The footage was taken from the neighbouring railway bridge which is undamaged, and broadcast by the pro-Kremlin Crimea 24 channel.
We may not know exactly what happened to the bridge for some time. Reuters reports that Russia blamed Ukraine for an attack on the bridge last October, but the country admitted only indirectly to it months later.
Today, Serhiy Bratchuk, spokesperson for Ukraine’s Odesa military administration, has posted a photo on his Telegram account of what seemed to show part of the bridge broken. But it was not immediately clear whether that was related to any attack.
Russia’s transport ministry said there was damage to the road on the bridge closer to the Crimean Peninsula, but there was no damage to the pillars. It did not say what caused the damage.
In recent weeks, traffic jams to the entrance of the bridge have stretched for kilometres on a daily basis as Russian people went on holiday.
This morning the traffic jam ran for kilometres before police directed vehicles away from the bridge. Social media accounts showed cars lined up on the bridge and its entrance.
Here’s the full story following the reported explosions on Crimea’s Kerch Bridge, from the Guardian’s Emma Graham-Harrison.
The Kerch Bridge connecting the Crimean peninsula to Russia has been closed by an “emergency” that killed two people and injured a child, after local residents reported hearing explosions in the early hours of Monday morning.
The heavily guarded road and rail link is among the Kremlin’s most important and high-prestige infrastructure projects, and the only overland link that goes directly from Russia to occupied Crimea.
Cars heading for the bridge were stopped early on Monday morning after the head of the Russian-controlled administration in Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, said there was “an emergency situation” on the 145th pillar of the bridge.
Mattha Busby here taking over the blog from my colleague Helen Livingston. I’m on Twitter here or email mattha.busby.freelance@guardian.co.uk
Russia is suffering from a shortage of “counter-battery radars”, which are key to allowing commanders to “rapidly locate enemy gun lines,” the UK’s Ministry of Defence has said in its latest intelligence update on the conflict.
“Russian ground forces survivability relies on effectively detecting Ukrainian artillery and striking against it,” the MoD added.
“After being sacked by as commander of Russia’s 58th Combined Arms Army (58 CAA) in Ukraine, General-Major Ivan Popov claimed that one of his key complaints had been about the lack of counter battery provision,” the ministry wrote.
Ukrainian forces have recaptured a total of seven square kilometres in the past week around the eastern city of Bakhmut, which was captured by Russian forces in May, the deputy defence minister, Hanna Maliar, has said.
“On the southern flank around Bakhmut we have been advancing every day during the past week,” she wrote on Telegram.
In total Ukrainian forces have liberated 31 square kilometres in the Bakhmut area during the counteroffensive, she said.
Pictures are circulating on social media which show the damage done to the bridge in more detail:
https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMie2h0dHBzOi8vd3d3LnRoZWd1YXJkaWFuLmNvbS93b3JsZC9saXZlLzIwMjMvanVsLzE3L3J1c3NpYS11a3JhaW5lLXdhci1saXZlLWNyaW1lYW4tYnJpZGdlLWVtZXJnZW5jeS10cmFmZmljLXN0b3BzLWV4cGxvc2lvbtIBe2h0dHBzOi8vYW1wLnRoZWd1YXJkaWFuLmNvbS93b3JsZC9saXZlLzIwMjMvanVsLzE3L3J1c3NpYS11a3JhaW5lLXdhci1saXZlLWNyaW1lYW4tYnJpZGdlLWVtZXJnZW5jeS10cmFmZmljLXN0b3BzLWV4cGxvc2lvbg?oc=5
2023-07-17 07:31:00Z
2203024599
Tidak ada komentar:
Posting Komentar