Day 231 Roundup: Russia Detains Eight People in Connection with Crimean Bridge Blast; Another Oil Pipeline Leak Reported

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Facts

  • Russia's intelligence and security service, the FSB, says it has detained eight people in connection with the blast that collapsed parts of the Crimean Bridge on Oct. 8. The agency said five Russian nationals were arrested, in addition to two Ukrainians and an Armenian. The service also alleged the attack was masterminded by the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry.1
  • The FSB noted that explosives were disguised in polyethylene wraps and loaded onto a truck in 22 pallets, collectively weighing over 22 tons. It claimed the truck was shipped to Bulgaria from the port of Odesa in Ukraine, passing through Armenia, Georgia, and across the border to Russia before making its way to the Crimean Bridge. A Ukrainian interior ministry spokesman dismissed the investigation as 'nonsense.'1
  • Meanwhile, another leak in a pipeline carrying Russian gas to Germany was reported on Wednesday. Poland's top official in charge of energy infrastructure, Mateusz Berger, has alleged there is no reason to believe that sabotage played a role in the Druzhba pipeline leak, which was reported in Polish territory.2
  • At the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency Rafael Grossi said external power supplies had been cut and that the building had been forced to rely on back-up diesel generators for the second time in five days. He called it a 'deeply worrying development.' A Russian-appointed official in Zaporizhzhia later said power was restored within the hour.3
  • Elsewhere, Oleksii Reznikov, Ukraine's minister for defense, announced that the country had received four additional High Mobility Advanced Rocket Systems (HIMARS) from the US, in addition to the first of four IRIS-T missile defense systems from Germany. Reznikov further confirmed the US would be delivering National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NASAMS) to Ukraine.4
  • On the ground, as Ukrainian forces claimed to have consolidated gains in five settlements of the southern Kherson region, renewed Russian attacks were reported in Sumy, Zaporizhzhia, Lviv, Vinnytsia, Mykolaiv and Dnipropetrovsk, where three civilians were reported injured. At least seven civilians were reported killed and eight more injured in a Russian strike on the city of Avdiivka in Donetsk.5

Sources: 1TASS, 2Finance, 3Associated Press, 4Ukrayinska Pravda (a) and 5Ukrayinska Pravda (b).

Narratives

  • Anti-Russia narrative, as provided by PBS NewsHour. This invasion is an egregious violation of international law. Putin's ultimate aim is to restore the Soviet empire, even if it takes massive bloodshed and false pretexts such as calling the 2014 Ukrainian revolution after an election a 'coup'. This unprovoked attack is the latest chapter in Putin's Orwellian attempt to rewrite history.
  • Pro-Russia narrative, as provided by National Security Archive. NATO and the US have ignored Russia's security concerns by breaking its promise not to expand eastward in return for German reunification. These concerns are legitimate and taking them seriously would have avoided the Ukraine tragedy.

Predictions