The Ukrainian army says it has attacked the Ukrainian peninsula annexed by Moscow. Kiev speaks of a “combined strike” against a Russian military airfield.
The Ukrainian army claims to have attacked a Russian military airfield on Thursday near the town of Saky on the Moscow-annexed Ukrainian Crimean peninsula.
“Ukrainian Defense Forces carried out a combined attack against an occupier military airfield near the town of Saky on the night of Wednesday to Thursday,” the army communications center said on Telegram, without giving further details.
“Significant damage”
A source within the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) stated that it was a joint operation between the SBU and the naval forces.
The Ukrainians “used drones that exhausted the Russian air defense system before firing Neptune projectiles,” new Ukrainian-made cruise missiles with a range of 300 kilometers, the source assured.
The attack caused “significant damage to the occupants’ equipment,” while there were at least twelve Su-24 and Su-30 fighter jets at the airfield at the time of the attack, the source said, promising an intensification of Kiev’s attacks against the peninsula.
Crimea in Ukraine’s sights
Crimea, which has been under Moscow’s control since 2014, is increasingly the target of Ukrainian attacks.
On Wednesday, Russian-appointed authorities said they had foiled Ukrainian missile and drone attacks on Sevastopol and the region of this major port used by the Russian fleet. According to Sevastopol Governor Mikhail Rasvoyaev, Ukrainian forces attacked the city with missiles and two neighboring towns, Katcha and Verkhnesadovoye, with drones.
On September 13, a strike at a shipyard in Sevastopol damaged two ships and injured 24 people. In August, after a commando operation by the Ukrainian armed forces, there was a particularly massive attack with 42 drones on the peninsula.
The Ukrainian military has also repeatedly attacked Russian ships traveling in the Black Sea or docked in Crimea and Russian coastal ports.