The report described the Saki air base, which was rocked by explosions last Tuesday, as a cruel but unique loss for Russian military infrastructure on the peninsula, with subsequent attacks as evidence of Ukraine’s systematic military ability to target Crimea.
The August 9 incident at Saki Air Base, which destroyed at least seven military aircraft, severely damaged the base and killed at least one person.
Russia claimed it was the result of an accident, and Ukrainian officials have so far refused to confirm they were responsible.
Speaking after the incident, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the war “started with Crimea and must end with Crimea — its liberation.”
Another series of explosions were reported in Crimea this week, on August 16, this time at an ammunition depot in Maiske and at an airfield in Gvardeyskoe.
Russian officials said the Maiske incident was the result of sabotage, but did not specify what kind of sabotage or who they believed was responsible.
Acts of sabotage
The attacks come as the resistance movement born in Russia’s occupied territories carries out acts of sabotage.
Over the weekend, Ukrainian officials confirmed that a railway bridge near Melitopol, which the Russians used to transport military equipment and weapons from occupied Crimea, was blown up by Ukrainian guerrillas.
As analysts speculate there is a campaign to degrade Russia’s military capability in Crimea, Zelensky on Tuesday warned Ukrainians living in occupied territories to avoid military installations of Russian forces. And referring to the long kilometers of queues of civilian vehicles trying to leave Crimea for Russia, Zelensky said: “The queue these days to leave Crimea for Russia through the bridge proves that the absolute majority of its citizens terrorist state has already understood or at least feel that Crimea is not a place for them.”
Russia’s state road agency on Tuesday reported a new traffic record on a Crimean bridge days after the explosions at the Saki air base.
“During the day on August 15, 38,297 cars crossed the bridge in both directions,” the statement said.
Local officials downplayed the size of the lines, saying they were a result of tighter controls on the bridge for safety reasons rather than an increase in outbound traffic.
“In terms of them leaving Crimea, this is a complete lie, there is no doubt about it,” the head of the Russian-controlled Crimean administration, Sergei Aksionov, told Russian state television on Tuesday.
However, he had last month acknowledged a hit to the tourism industry in Crimea, saying a 40% drop was expected in the summer. The Russian Tourism Association made a similar prediction in June.
Crimea was forcibly seized by Russia in 2014 — shortly after Ukrainian protesters helped oust pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych — when thousands of Russian-speaking soldiers wearing skimpy uniforms poured into the peninsula in early March of that year. Two weeks later, Russia completed its annexation of Crimea in a referendum that was criticized by Ukraine and most of the world as illegal, and was then seen as Europe’s biggest land grab since World War II.
