Moscow announced today that it had repulsed a “crazy” attempt by Kiev forces to retake the strategically important Fidonisi, off the coast of southern Ukraine in the Black Sea, which was occupied by Moscow at the beginning of its offensive in Ukraine.
This small island became famous on the first day of the war when Ukrainian border guards stationed there rejected the demand for a Russian warship to surrender, with a member of the guard answering the Russians to “go and marry …”
Apart from its symbolic value, the island is also of strategic importance due to its location off the coasts of Ukraine and Romania, which provides a privileged observatory and a place for the development of ground-to-air defense systems.
Moscow has said in the past that it has thwarted efforts to bring Ukrainian forces closer together, but what it says today seems to be discerning the extent of the means used.
“On Monday, June 20, at 5 a.m., the Kiev regime made another insane attempt to seize Fidonisi,” said Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov.
According to him, the Ukrainian forces “planned to carry out aerial bombardments and massive artillery strikes (…) before landing and occupying” the island.
The Russian official stressed that 15 Ukrainian attack and reconnaissance drones were involved in an air raid and that arrays of rocket launchers and mortars fired at the island.
However, Russian anti-aircraft and anti-missile defense systems intercepted all missiles and shot down 13 drones, “forcing the enemy to abandon any landing on Fidonisi,” Konashenkov said.
He added that Russian radars had spotted a US RQ-4 “Global Hawk” surveillance drone in the island.
Konashenkov’s statements can not be verified by an independent source.
According to him, after this failure, Ukrainian forces targeted hydrocarbon drilling rigs in the Black Sea.
Authorities in Crimea, a peninsula annexed by Moscow in 2014, said today that one of these infrastructures was still burning. Seven people are missing.
Source: AMPE
Source: Capital
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