KYIV, Ukraine (AP) – Ukraine said Tuesday its forces struck a railway bridge, a power plant and other key infrastructure targets in Crimea as Kyiv’s military seeks to isolate the vital Russian-held peninsula in the latest stage of the 4-year-old war.
The drone attacks added to the woes on the Black Sea peninsula, where Russian authorities have had to suspend gasoline sales to civilians as Ukraine has intensified its recent campaign to disrupt supply lines and the electrical grid at the height of the summer tourist season.
The peninsula was seized by force and illegally annexed by Moscow in 2014. Ukraine’s increasing use of long-range strikes has highlighted its ability to inflict painful damage on Russia and put added pressure on the Kremlin while Moscow’s advances recently have ground to a near halt, Western analysts and officials say.
Ukrainian Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov said last week that his forces are “isolating Crimea with drones.”
“It looks like in the nearest time, Crimea will become an island. This could lead to some very unexpected consequences for Russians,” Fedorov said on a blogger’s YouTube channel.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow had been warned that Ukraine aimed to disrupt energy supplies and Russia´s tourism industry. He didn´t say who gave the warning.
Ukrainian drones “coming in a huge stream” seek to “destabilize” Russian society, Putin said.
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 also said scheduled maintenance at refineries had been postponed.
Ukraine also has hit targets near to the Kremlin in Moscow and in St. Petersburg, Russia’s second-largest city this month.
Ukraine’s Defense 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.
In addition, Ukraine´s Special Operations Forces said their units, working with what they said was the resistance movement in Crimea, destroyed a rail bridge over the North Crimean Canal near the village of Rozdolne.
The military described the span 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 early Tuesday targeted railway repair equipment deployed at the bridge and its remaining sections, it said on Telegram.
It was not possible to independently verify the Ukrainian claims, and Russian officials made no immediate comment.
Parts of Crimea were without power Tuesday, the area´s energy supplier said. But it attributed the outages to “technical malfunctions” in local electrical grids and said it expected power to be restored within 24 hours.
The diamond-shaped peninsula is important because of its naval bases and beaches, as well as its strategic location in the Black Sea. Russia has spent centuries fighting for it.
Russian-appointed officials in Crimea have appeared reluctant to discuss attacks on the peninsula, but new security measures suggest deepening tension.
Its Ministry of Sport on Tuesday canceled all sporting events, competitions, and training sessions for children through Sept. 1. It described the measures as “aimed solely at ensuring the safety of our children, athletes, and anyone who is involved with sport.”
On Monday, Gov. Sergei Aksyonov said that for security reasons, all summer camps in the region had stopped accepting children and new bookings until Sept. 1.
On the front line in eastern Ukraine, where Russia’s war of attrition has made slow and costly advances since Moscow’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, Ukraine has deployed cutting-edge drone technology to keep the enemy pinned down.
Meanwhile, its medium-range drones have also disrupted Russia’s supply lines to the front, and its long-range strikes have increasingly damaged Russian oil facilities that provide vital revenue for the Kremlin´s war effort.
The Ukrainian Defense Ministry said Monday its forces have hit more than 800,000 enemy targets with drones since the beginning of the year and that 95% of drones used by the armed forces are domestically produced.
The successes have boosted Ukrainian confidence, and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says sustained foreign support is locked in to help stop Russia.
Officials have shown renewed vigor in talking about the war.
Ukraine’s U.N. Ambassador Andrii Melnyk said Monday that Kyiv remained ready for direct talks with Russia to achieve a “just and lasting peace” based on the U.N. Charter, but warned that Ukraine´s willingness to compromise was not open-ended.
Melnyk said at a U.N. Security Council meeting that a ceasefire along the current front line already represented a major concession and urged Russia to withdraw from occupied Ukrainian territory.
He also said recent Ukrainian strikes had altered the dynamics of the war, adding: “This is just the beginning.”
Meanwhile, the Kremlin is ready to “ensure the security” of its neighbor and ally Belarus, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Tuesday, days after Zelenskyy demanded that Belarus remove relay equipment on its territory that Kyiv said aided Russian drone attacks.
The relay stations are used for signal transmissions to Russian drones attacking Ukraine, according to Zelenskyy.
Lavrov told the Russian news agency Interfax that Kyiv was trying to drag Belarus into the conflict. Moscow, in fact, had used Belarus’ territory to launch its invasion of Ukraine.