Russian President Vladimir Putin has blamed the Ukrainian secret service SBU for the massive explosion on the Crimean bridge. “There is no doubt. This is an act of terrorism aimed at destroying critical civilian infrastructure in the Russian Federation,” Putin said on Sunday evening. Kyiv has not yet admitted involvement in the attack.
Russian citizens and foreign states helped prepare the terrorist attack, said the head of the national investigative agency, Alexander Bastrykin, at the meeting with Putin, from which the state media published video clips. The Kremlin has announced that Putin will meet with the Russian National Security Council this Monday. A reaction to the attack could be discussed there.
On Saturday morning, an explosion shook the 19-kilometer bridge that connects Russia and the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, annexed by Moscow in 2014. Around seven and a half months after the start of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine, Putin’s strategically and symbolically important heart project was severely damaged. According to official information from Moscow, three people died. In the meantime, rail and car traffic have been completely stopped, but have now largely resumed.
In a first reaction on Saturday, Russia’s national investigative committee announced that, according to preliminary information, a truck had exploded on the bridge. Bastrykin now said that many witnesses and eyewitnesses had been questioned. Investigations into the attack continued, including analysis of explosives, genetic and criminal expertise. Ukrainian media, on the other hand, already suspected that the Ukrainian secret service could be behind it.
