7/22/2023-|Last update: 7/22/202310:52 PM (Mecca Time)
The Ukrainian army said today, Saturday, that the “season of explosions” in the Crimea has come, while Moscow has raised the state of high alert in anticipation of accidents in Crimea and the bridge linking it with the Russian lands, while an American newspaper quoted US officials that the administration of President Joe Biden is sticking at the present time to refusing to supply Ukraine with long-range missiles.
The spokeswoman for the Southern Operations Command of the Ukrainian army, Natalia Homenyuk, stated that the bombing of the supply lines of Russian forces in Crimea will continue; She pointed out that her country adhered to the warning it issued earlier that the season of explosions in Crimea had come.
Hominyuk said, “It is clear that he is suffering from a weak logistical ability to send or withdraw military equipment. We are continuing with missile strikes and we will hit the enemy’s depth where he keeps his strategic stocks.”
Russia annexed Crimea in 2013, in a move rejected by the United Nations and Western countries, while Ukraine pledged to recover the peninsula located in the south of the country.
Today, Saturday, the Ukrainian forces announced that they had carried out an attack on two weapons and oil depots of the Russian army in the Krasnogvardeisky district in central Crimea.
The pro-Russian governor of Crimea, Sergei Aksenov, confirmed the attack, which caused explosions in the warehouse, and said that the bombing did not result in any casualties, and that all residents were evacuated from the areas adjacent to the warehouse within a radius of 5 kilometers; It was announced that work will resume on the Crimean railway, after it was suspended twice.
Russian media broadcast scenes that they said were of Ukrainian marches targeting infrastructure facilities in the Krasnogvardeisky district of Crimea.
In another sign of security concerns in Crimea, Oleg Kreuchkov, an adviser to Aksenov, warned people not to post pictures of important infrastructure online, and urged citizens who knew the identity of the publishers to report them to the Interior Ministry or the Russian Federal Security Service.
And the Ukrainian president said – in a video speech to the Aspen Security Forum (ASF) in the United States on Friday – that movement on the Crimean Bridge should be disrupted, stressing that it was built in violation of international law. He considered that the bridge contributes to supplying Russian forces in Crimea with ammunition.
The Crimean Bridge is a vital logistical link for supplying Russian forces on the peninsula, and the frequency of attacks on Crimea on the Black Sea has increased in recent weeks, and Russian President Vladimir Putin has called for strengthening security measures on the strategic bridge.
A member of the State Duma (lower chamber of the Russian Parliament) Nikolai Novichkov told Al-Jazeera that Ukraine’s attack on the Crimean Bridge violated the rules of war, and that it would be investigated and those responsible for it punished. The Russian deputy added that “Crimea is not a military target and everyone knows this, it is a tourist area where only civilians live.”
Atacams missiles
The Washington Post quoted US officials as saying that US President Joe Biden’s administration is insisting on not supplying Ukraine with long-range ATACMS missiles, despite pressure from members of Congress and requests from Kiev.
At the end of May, Washington changed its position refusing to supply Ukraine with Atakms missiles, which are tactical weapons with a range of 300 km, and said that it was still considering the possibility of supplying the Ukrainian army with these weapons.
US President Biden and his Ukrainian counterpart discussed during the NATO summit in Lithuania last June the issue of Atakms missiles, but Washington did not take a final decision in this regard.
The American newspaper stated that the US Department of Defense (the Pentagon) believes that Kiev is in more need of weapons other than Atakms missiles, and that the ministry is concerned that sending a quantity of these missiles to Ukraine may reduce the readiness of the US army in any possible conflict in the future.
On the other hand, Konstantin Kosattsov – Vice-President of the Russian Federation Council – held both Ukraine and the United States responsible for the killing of Russian journalist Rostislav Zhuravlyov, who died today, Saturday, in a cluster bomb explosion in Zaporizhia, southeastern Ukraine.
Kosachev stressed – through his account on Telegram – that all US and Ukrainian assurances that cluster munitions will not be used against civilians are lies.
On a topic related to cluster munitions, the governor of the Russian Beglorod region, Vyacheslav Gladkov, accused Ukraine – today, Saturday, of using cluster bombs in the Belgorod border region with Ukraine. Gladkov explained that the Ukrainian forces fired at least 3 cluster bombs on the village of Zhuravlyovka.
There was no immediate comment from the Ukrainian side on the Russian accusations.
And this July, the White House confirmed that the United States would provide Kiev with cluster bombs as part of a $800 million security aid package.
cereal file
On the other hand, the Ukrainian President said – today, Saturday – that he had identified, in a phone call with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, the priority and future steps necessary to open the grain corridor in the Black Sea, and to operate it sustainably.
For his part, the Secretary-General of NATO condemned what he described as Moscow’s attempt to use food as a weapon, in response to Russia’s withdrawal from the Istanbul agreement to export Ukrainian grain through the Black Sea, an agreement that collapsed on July 20.
Moscow justified its withdrawal from the agreement – which was mediated by the United Nations and Turkey – by continuing to obstruct Western sanctions on Russia from exporting Russian grain and fertilizers to global markets.
The agreement came to solve the crisis of millions of tons of grain that had accumulated in Ukrainian ports as a result of the ongoing war.
Yesterday, Friday, the UN Coordinator for Humanitarian Affairs, Martin Griffiths, warned of the rise in global grain prices, and of the catastrophic consequences of the risk of an expansion of the war, which may include the possibility of famine.
Griffiths said – before the UN Security Council session on the grain issue in the Black Sea – that food and fertilizer exports from Ukraine and Russia are of paramount importance to ensuring global food security.
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2023-07-22 19:41:15
