Ukraine Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Maliar has made what appears to be the clearest admission yet that Ukrainian forces were responsible for an attack last October on the bridge connecting Russia and Crimea, which Moscow has controlled since it seized the peninsula in 2014.
“273 days ago, (we) launched the first strike on the Crimean bridge to disrupt Russian logistics,” she said, on Telegram.
CNN has contacted the Armed Forces of Ukraine for a statement about the claim of responsibility of the bridge explosion but has yet to receive a response.
The attack on the Kerch bridge, which disrupted major transport links between mainland Russia and the annexed Crimean peninsula, not only struck a blow against Russia’s military effort in Ukraine but also represented a psychological blow for Moscow and a major propaganda victory for Kyiv.
Ukrainian officials celebrated the blast at the time but did not make a clear claim of responsibility.
It took place the day after Russian leader Vladimir Putin turned 70, and Ukraine’s Secretary of the National Security and Defence Council Oleksiy Danilov published a video of the bridge in flames alongside a video of Marilyn Monroe singing Happy Birthday, Mister President.
Among other responses, the Ukrainian navy posted on Facebook, “Air defence of the Russian Federation, are you sleeping?” alongside a video showing a section of the bridge’s road that had been completely destroyed.
Maliar’s post on Sunday caught the attention of Russian state media and officials. Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova once again called President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s government a “terrorist regime” in an online statement condemning the attack.
Russian-installed authorities in the Crimean peninsula on Sunday reported shooting down a cruise missile near the city of Kerch and briefly suspending traffic on the bridge.
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The Moscow-appointed governor of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, said the interception of the missile by Russian air defences didn’t result in any damage or casualties. He didn’t offer any details, including the type of the missile and its origin.
In the nearby Russian region of Rostov, authorities on Sunday also reported shooting down a missile.
Governor Vasily Golubev said the missile was Ukrainian, and its debris damaged the roofs of several buildings. No casualties have been reported.
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Such attacks far beyond the front line on Russian regions on the border with Ukraine or the annexed Crimean peninsula have become common during the war in Ukraine that has just surpassed its 500-day mark.
Officials in Russian regions and Moscow-appointed authorities in Crimea, which was illegally annexed in 2014, have regularly reported explosions, drone strikes, and even cross-border raids by Ukrainian saboteurs. Kyiv has never openly taken responsibility for these attacks.
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