Ukraine on Thursday struck an important bridge linking annexed Crimea to a southern region partially occupied by Russia.
The attack comes at a time when Moscow says the counter-offensive launched by Kyiv is marking time.
Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula annexed by Moscow in 2014, serves as a rear base for Russian forces, particularly for sending reinforcements and maintaining equipment. The few bridges linking the peninsula to the occupied south of Ukraine are essential to the conduct of these operations.
“During the night, a strike hit the Chongar bridge,” made up of two parallel roads linking Crimea to the Kherson region in southern Ukraine, Crimea’s Russian governor, Sergei Aksionov, announced. He added that the strike had not caused any casualties.
The bridge is on the most direct route between Crimea and Melitopol, one of the largest cities captured by the Russians in southern Ukraine as part of their offensive.
The head of the administration for the occupied part of the Kherson region, Vladimir Saldo, said Ukrainian forces had likely used British Storm Shadow long-range missiles, a claim unverifiable from independent sources.
Saldo released a video showing the two sections of the bridge damaged by the strike, one visibly more severely affected, with a gaping hole in the roadway opening onto the water below.
Ukrainian forces “are trying to intimidate the people of Kherson, to spread panic among the population,” he charged.
Crimea is regularly targeted by Ukrainian attacks, including drone strikes. In October 2022, a powerful explosion severely damaged the only bridge directly linking the annexed peninsula to Russia.
