RUSSIA KEEPS USING THE OCCUPIED CRIMEA AS A MILITARY POLYGON IGNORING THE PENINSULA PROBLEMS

The Russian occupiers continue to use the Crimea solely to solve their own political interests, completely ignoring the needs of the local population as well as growing ecological problems, triggered by separation from Ukraine.

Military and civic observers note that Russia keeps militarization of the Crimean peninsula with the deployment of a large military contingent and the transfer of a huge number of military equipment and missile systems. The barbaric attitude of Russians to foreign land has already placed this part of the territory of Ukraine on the brink of an ecological catastrophe. Consequences of disordered military activity were massive fuel leaks, including into the Black Sea water-space.

The critical economic and environmental situation in the occupied territory of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, as well as the harassment of the local population by Russian security forces, adversely affects the socio-political situation all-over the peninsula. In this connection, the Kremlin is considering the creation of prerequisites for the introduction of a tougher police regime in the Crimea and creation of an artificial occasion to attract more units of the Russian Armed Forces, as well as further escalation of the Russian-Ukrainian war with seizure of part of southeastern territory of the Kherson Oblast'.

According to available information, the Russian special services are considering the possibility of carrying out a number of provocations in the peninsula in the near future (August), including the carrying out of terrorist acts against the civilian population with mass casualties. Public places (shopping centers, markets, mass events) and infrastructure facilities (water supply points and fuel depots) can be chosen as the main targets. As the situation in the Donbas shows, Russian occupants have excelled in using heavy weapons against civilian population as well as air defense missiles against civil aviation. These methods with mass casualties have already become the calling card of the criminal Russian authorities in the armed aggression against Ukraine.

All these provocations of the Kremlin, traditionally will be called a work of "Ukrainian diversion and saboutage group" and "the bloody junta of Kyiv." Secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation Nikolay Patrushev hinted about it during the visit to Sevastopol, saying that at present there is a high threat of destabilization of the situation in Crimea as a result of the aggressive policy of the Ukrainian authorities and members of radical pro-Ukrainian organizations. Tracking the trends in the implementation of such actions by Russian special services, one should be taken into account, that in recent time a campaign to form public opinion has been gradually launched in local media about the existing threat begins. And, in fact, creating an artificial reason for the use of Russian troops to seize part of the southeastern territory of the Kherson Oblast.

Dmytro Timchuck