Two people from Russia’s Belgorod region, a mother and father, were killed in the “emergency” on the Crimean bridge and their daughter was injured, the region’s governor has said on Telegram.
“This morning we all started with information about the emergency that happened on the Crimean bridge. We all saw a video on the internet of a damaged car with Belgorod number plates,” Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote.
“The girl was injured, moderately injured … The hardest thing is that her parents died, dad and mom.”
Russia is suffering from a shortage of “counter-battery radars”, which are key to allowing commanders to “rapidly locate enemy gun lines,” the UK’s Ministry of Defence has said in its latest intelligence update on the conflict.
“Russian ground forces survivability relies on effectively detecting Ukrainian artillery and striking against it,” the MoD added.
“After being sacked by as commander of Russia’s 58th Combined Arms Army (58 CAA) in Ukraine, General-Major Ivan Popov claimed that one of his key complaints had been about the lack of counter battery provision,” the ministry wrote.
Ukrainian forces have recaptured a total of seven square kilometres in the past week around the eastern city of Bakhmut, which was captured by Russian forces in May, the deputy defence minister, Hanna Maliar, has said.
“On the southern flank around Bakhmut we have been advancing every day during the past week,” she wrote on Telegram.
In total Ukrainian forces have liberated 31 square kilometres in the Bakhmut area during the counteroffensive, she said.
Pictures are circulating on social media which show the damage done to the bridge in more detail:
If you’re just joining us, here’s a quick summary of what we know so far about the incident in Crimea:
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Two people, a mother and father, have been killed and their daughter injured in an “emergency” on the Crimean bridge linking the peninsula with the Russian region of Krasnodar, Russian authorities say
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The road has been damaged near the Crimean end of the bridge, Russia’s Ministry of Transport has said, but it did not confirm reports that the pillars supporting the bridge had been damaged
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Russia’s Grey Zone channel, a heavily followed Telegram channel affiliated with the Wagner mercenary group, reported that there had been two strikes on the bridge at 03:04 a.m. (0004 GMT) and 03:20 a.m, according to Reuters. Reuters and the Guardian are not able to verify this report
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The incident could be an act of provocation by Moscow, Natalia Humeniuk, the spokesperson for Ukraine’s southern military command, has said, claiming that such events are a “typical way of solving problems by authorities of Crimea and the aggressor country”
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Train services across the bridge will resume by 9am local time (0600 GMT), the Russia-installed governor of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, has said, while further updates will be given on ferry services to Kuban, in Krasnodar
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Aksyonov also said law enforcement agencies would be giving more information about the causes of the “incident” by 9am
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The 19-km (12-mile) bridge over the Kerch Strait is the only direct link between the transport network of Russia and the Crimean peninsula, which Moscow annexed from Ukraine in 2014
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It consists of a separate roadway and railway, both supported by concrete stilts, which give way to a wider span held by steel arches at the point where ships pass between the Black Sea and the smaller Azov Sea
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The bridge is crucial for the supply of fuel, food and other products to Crimea, where the port of Sevastopol is the historic home base of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. It also became a major supply route for Russian forces after Moscow invaded Ukraine last year
The incident on the Crimea Bridge could be an act of provocation by Moscow, Natalia Humeniuk, the spokesperson for Ukraine’s southern military command, has said according to Reuters.
“The creation of such provocations, which the occupying authorities of Crimea report immediately very loudly, is a typical way of solving problems by authorities of Crimea and the aggressor country,” Humeniuk told the national broadcaster Rada.
The wires have also meanwhile sent a series of pictures by photographer Oleg Petrasyuk from the frontline Donetsk town of Vuhledar. More than 14,000 people lived there before the war – now they number fewer than 100.
The town has been completely shattered; there is no water or electricity and no buildings that have not been damaged or completely destroyed by the fighting.
If you’re keen to read more on Vuhledar, the Guardian’s Dan Sabbagh and Ed Ram sent this report from the area back in February:
Reuters has sent some images of the Crimean bridge from this morning, which show there is no traffic currently on it. It’s difficult to make out any more detail:
While we try to find out more about what’s happening in Crimea, here’s a bit more from the ISW analysis that I mentioned earlier.
The apparent “chain of command crisis threatens to demoralize the wider Russian war effort in Ukraine” and could affect its ability to conduct offensive operations in southern Ukraine, the institute says.
The continued hollowing out of support for the Russian military leadership among field commanders will produce morale issues throughout the theater.
Further controversies about insubordination and command changes will likely increasingly reach a wider domestic audience as the Russian ultranationalist milblogger community continues to closely follow and amplify these developments.
The Kremlin’s failure to appeal to these commanders and their personnel while also failing to fully back [defence minister Sergei] Shoigu and [chief of the general staff Valery] Gerasimov may increasingly undermine the Kremlin’s desired goal to be viewed as an effective manager of the war in Ukraine.
Two people from Russia’s Belgorod region, a mother and father, were killed in the “emergency” on the Crimean bridge and their daughter was injured, the region’s governor has said on Telegram.
“This morning we all started with information about the emergency that happened on the Crimean bridge. We all saw a video on the internet of a damaged car with Belgorod number plates,” Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote.
“The girl was injured, moderately injured … The hardest thing is that her parents died, dad and mom.”
Train services across the Crimea bridge will resume by 9am local time (0600 GMT), the Russia-installed governor of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, has said – that’s in about an hour and a half.
In a post on his Telegram account, Aksyonov said more information on the operation of ferry services would also be given before 9am and that law enforcement agencies would be giving more information about the causes of the “incident”.
Aksyonov had spoken to Russia’s first deputy minister of transport, Andrey Alexandrovich Kostyuk, he added.
A child has been injured as a result of the “emergency” on the Crimean bridge, Russia’s Tass news agency is reporting, citing Crimean authorities. It said the child would be transported to Russia’s Krasnodar region by air ambulance.
More from the ISW, which says president Vladimir Putin has consistently undermined the Russian MoD and made it into a “scapegoat” for all Russian military failures, making it hard for defence minister Sergei Shoigu and chief of the general staff Valery Gerasimov to impress their authority on subordinates:
The Kremlin’s chronic disregard for the Russian chain of command is likely hindering Shoigu and Gerasimov in their attempts to suppress insubordination and establish full control over the Russian military in Ukraine.
Putin consistently bypassed or ignored the established chain of command in hopes of securing rapid successes on the battlefield throughout the war, degrading Shoigu’s and Gerasimov’s authority …
Putin also established the Russian MoD as the scapegoat for all Russian military failures, which saddled Shoigu and Gerasimov with a reputation for incompetence and failure that they are unlikely to repair.
In other Russia-Ukraine related news, Moscow’s Ministry of Defence has begun to “remove commanders from some of the Russian military’s most combat effective units” and “appears to be accelerating this effort”, the Institute for the Study of War has said in its latest analysis of the conflict.
The arrests and dismissals, including that of Maj Gen Ivan Popov, appear “to be associated with cases of insubordination”, the US-based thinktank says.
Popov flagrantly attempted to bypass Russian Chief of the General Staff and overall theater commander Army General Valery Gerasimov and directly bring his complaints about the frontline in western Zaporizhia to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The ISW also reports that “insubordination among commanders appears to be spreading to some of their soldiers” and that the “intensifying dynamic of insubordination among Russian commanders in Ukraine may prompt other commanders to oppose the Russian military leadership more overtly.”
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