Kyiv intelligence chief says a colonel general and lieutenant general are among injured but does not confirm reports of death of Black Sea fleet Admiral Viktor Sokolov
Andrey Kortunov, an adviser to the Russian foreign ministry and director of Russian international affairs council, has been on the BBC Radio 4’s Today programme discussing the strike on Russian navy’s Black Sea HQ.
Kortunov emphasised the “psychological” importance of long range missiles being used in the strike. “I think psychologically it’s important because it’s a long range missile – its destruction power is pretty significant. But militarily, I don’t think it really makes that big a damage – after all it didn’t hit any really critical military targets and the damage at least according to the reports we received is quite limited.”
Who opened investigations? Germany, Denmark and Sweden, a the leaks happened in their exclusive economic zones.
What have they found? German federal prosecutors seized objects from a sailing yacht in January and found traces of explosives.
Meanwhile, Sweden’s public prosecutor said the “primary assumption is that a state is behind it”.
What has Ukraine said? The New York Times reported in March that US officials had seen information suggesting it was done by a “pro-Ukrainian group”, without Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s knowledge. Zelenskiy has repeatedly denied Ukraine was behind the sabotage.
Could it be a false flag? Andreas Umland, an analyst at the Stockholm Centre for Eastern European Studies, views Russia as “the most likely” culprit. The Kremlin has denied responsibility.
