Satellite photos released Thursday show devastation at Russia's air base inCrimeaandKyiv I was hit with an attack suggesting the possibility of }. Gained new long-range strike capabilities that could change the course of war.
Photographs from the independent satellite company Planet Labs showed three near-identical craters where the building of Russia's Saki Air Force Base had apparently been hit precisely. A base on the southwestern coast of Crimea suffered extensive fire damage, with the charred shells of at least eight wrecked fighter planes clearly visible.
Russia denied damage to the aircraft and said the explosion at its base on Tuesday was accidental. It also does not say exactly what was done.
READ MORE: Russia struggles to replenish Ukrainian troops as war drags on
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They accused each other of shelling the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant again on Thursday, days after exchanging the same accusations that caused widespread concern.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres said early Thursday morning that all fighting near Europe's largest factory owned by Russian forces and run by Ukrainian workers would be halted, as well as near the front lines of the fighting. I called on both sides.
A Russian-appointed local official said Ukraine had twice shelled the factory and disrupted shift changes, the Russian news agency TASS reported.
Reuters was unable to independently verify the battlefield report.
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Regarding the damage to Saki Air Base, Ukrainian Presidential Advisor Mikhail Podoljak said: There are many,” he said.
"Officially, we are neither confirming nor denying anything … bearing in mind that there were several blast epicenters at exactly the same time," he told Reuters.
Read more: At least nine Russian fighter jets destroyed in Crimea strike, Ukraine says
Western military experts said the scale of damage and apparent accuracy of strikes suggested powerful new capabilities with potentially significant implications.
Russia, which occupied and annexed Crimea in 2014, uses the peninsula as a base for its Black Sea Fleet and as a major supply route for invading forces occupying southern Ukraine. the next few weeks.
"I'm not an Intel analyst, but I can't see well," Mark Hartling, a former commander of the US Army in Europe, wrote on Twitter, referring to the Russian bases.
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"I. That's so good," says his fellow ex-CIA and National Security Director Michael Hayden tweeted.
The War Research Institute thinks tanks have warned that Ukrainian officials have called the Crimean offensive "in the south." "The beginning of the Ukrainian counterattack, which suggests that Ukrainian forces anticipate heavy fighting in August and September that could determine the outcome of the next phase of the war."
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How the attack took place remains a mystery. Some Ukrainian officials are said to have suggested it may have been sabotage by an intruder. However, nearly identical impact craters and simultaneous explosions seem to indicate that they were hit by a volley of weapons capable of evading Russian defenses. While within the version, it far exceeds the range of the advanced rockets that the West has ever admitted to sending to Ukraine. Ukraine also has anti-ship missiles, which could theoretically be used to hit land targets.
A new phase
Ukrainian Brigadier General Oleksiy Khoromov said Russia had doubled its airstrikes on Ukrainian positions since last week, but after the destruction, Russia's At the Crimean base, which said the intensity of airborne activity had declined.
"As a result of the specified actions, the intensity of the use of aviation on the Southern Front has somewhat decreased," he told a press conference.
Ukraine withdrew Russian troops from her capital Kyiv in March and from the outskirts of her second largest city Kharkov in May. Russia then occupied eastern territories in heavy fighting, killing thousands of soldiers on both sides in June.
Although the front line has moved little since then, Kyiv has made major strides in recapturing southern Kherson and the Zaporizhia region, the main part of the territory occupied since the February 24 invasion. says it is preparing for
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Russia strengthened these areas, but its defenses fire thousands of shells a day It relies on supply lines to troops that are accustomed to doing so.
Tens of thousands of people died and millions fled. , the city was destroyed.
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On Thursday, Russia turned down a Swiss offer to represent Moscow's diplomatic interests in Kyiv. Sanctions against Russia.
Read more: Explosion at Russian air base sparks debate over whether it was a Ukrainian attack
Ukraine reported Russian artillery fire along the entire front, from around Kharkov in the northeast to eastern Donetsk and then to Zaporizhia, Kherson, and the banks of the wide Dnipro River in neighboring provinces.
Valentin Reznichenko, Governor of the Dnipropetrovsk Region, said that at Nikopol on the right bank of the Dnipro he was hit by 120 Russian Grad rockets, killing three and injuring seven. said.
Ukraine accused Russia on Wednesday of at least 13 dead and 10 wounded in rockets fired from near the Zaporizhia factory.
(Reported by Reuters Bureau, Written by Peter Graff and John Stonestreet, Edited by Hugh Lawson)
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