As a new Ukrainian attack took place in Crimea, Russia called the death in a Ukrainian bombardment of a Russian journalist a “heinous crime” and promised “a response” from its army.
Ukraine carried out a spectacular drone attack in Crimea on Saturday July 22, which blew up an ammunition depot. This new attack comes a few days after an assault on the Kerch Bridge, the only structure of its kind that connects the peninsula to Russia and is used in particular to transport equipment to the Russian military on the Ukrainian front. Franceinfo looks back on the highlights of the day.
Pro-Russian authorities accuse kyiv of causing the explosion of an ammunition depot in Crimea
The pro-Russian authorities installed in this annexed peninsula accused, on Saturday, Ukraine of having exploded an ammunition depot with drones. The incident caused the evacuation of the population “within a radius of five kilometers”, clarified on Telegram Sergei Aksionov, the leader of the occupation of annexed Crimea. The Ministry of Health of annexed Crimea announced at the end of the day that four people had been hospitalized, without giving further details on the nature of their injuries.
The attack also caused a suspension of road traffic on the Crimean Bridge. This was however very quickly restored, the pro-Russian authorities pointed out on Telegram. Rail traffic was also suspended for much of the day. Finally, at the end of the day on Saturday, Sergei Aksionov announced that the “rail traffic in the Krasnogvardeisky district”, where the attack took place, had “been restored”.
Kiev, which launched a counter-offensive in early June to retake the territories conquered by Moscow, affirms its intention to recover Crimea in particular, which Russia unilaterally attached to its territory in 2014. On Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the Kerch Bridge, built according to him in violation of international law, should be “neutralized”.
Russian journalist killed in bombing attributed to Ukraine
The Russian army announced that a journalist from the Russian news agency Ria Novosti, Rostislav Jouravlev, had been killed on Saturday in a Ukrainian bombardment in the region of Zaporizhya, in the south of Ukraine. “Units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine launched an artillery attack against a group of journalists”, “injuring four journalists more or less seriously”she accused.
Russian diplomacy denounced a “heinous crime” premeditated and judged the West “responsible” alongside Kyiv. “The perpetrators of the brutal massacre of the Russian journalist will inevitably receive the punishment they deserve”, she claimed, thus promising “answer” those responsible for this attack.
Ukrainian cameraman injured
At the same time, the German public television channel Deutsche Welle announced that one of its Ukrainian cameramen, Yevguen Chylko, had been injured by Russian submunition fire, while reporting on the Ukrainian army 23 kilometers from the front line on the Ukrainian side. During these shootings, a Ukrainian soldier was killed “and others were seriously injured”, she added in a press release.
Two other members of the channel’s team, a journalist and a security adviser, escaped unscathed. They were shooting a report on a Ukrainian army training center near Druzhkivka in Donbass, Donetsk Oblast. “The target of the Russian attack was probably the Ukrainian training ground”underlined Deutsche Welle.
An exchange between the Ukrainian president and the head of NATO on the grain corridor in the Black Sea
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Saturday that he had a telephone conversation with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on the “unblocking” of the grain corridor in the Black Sea. “We have (…) identified with Mr. Stoltenberg the priority and future steps necessary for the unblocking and sustainable exploitation of the grain corridor in the Black Sea”, declared Volodymyr Zelensky on Twitter, at the end of a week marked by a verbal escalation concerning the Black Sea, deemed unacceptable by the UN and which comes after Russia’s exit from the international agreement on Ukrainian grain exports.