May 27 (UPI) — A Ukrainian official confirmed Saturday the country’s military played a role in last year’s drone attack on a key Crimean bridge as well as on the Russian Black Sea Fleet.
Vasyl Maliuk, chief of the Security Service of Ukraine, or SBU, made the admission in a recent documentary film on the war with Russia, according to the agency’s website.
“According to the norms of our current legislation and international, customs and traditions of warfare, and taking into account the fact that it was a logistical route that we were obliged to cut to the enemy, certain such measures were carried out,” Malyuk says in the film.
In October 2022, a major explosion rocked the Russian-built, 11.8-mile Crimean Bridge linking the occupied Ukrainian peninsula to the Russian region of Krasnodar. The span has a route for vehicles and another for trains running parallel over the Kerch Strait.
Three people ultimately died after a truck exploded on the bridge, leading to a fire on a freight train carrying fuel. The bridge also partially collapsed. Russia at the time called it a terrorist attack, while Kyiv rarely confirms any operations carried out inside Russia.
Images showed parts of the bridge submerged under water.
Also called the Kerch Bridge, it is the longest in Europe and hailed at its opening in 2018 by Russian President Vladimir Putin as a symbol of the “restoration of historical justice” represented by Russia’s forced annexation of Crimea in March 2014.
“Regarding the situation with the Crimean fleet, namely the attack by water combat drones, the SBU was the author of that operational plan and implemented it,” Malyuk said, referring to multiple attacks on the Russian Navy’s Black Sea fleet in the major Crimean port city of Sevastopol.
