Ukraine special forces fight off Russian jet to retake strategic drilling rigs near Crimea, Kyiv says

Ukrainian special forces regained control of a number of oil and gas drilling platforms that Russia has used to help control the Black Sea in a “unique operation,” the country’s military intelligence (GUR) has said.

During the operation, the GUR said, there was a clash between Ukrainian special forces on boats and a Russian fighter jet, which was damaged and forced to retreat.

It said the platforms, close to Crimea and known as the Boika Towers, had been occupied since 2015 by Moscow, which seized and annexed the peninsula in 2014. The UK’s Ministry of Defence has previously said the platforms could be used to launch helicopters, position long-range missile systems and as a base for forward deployment.

“For Ukraine, regaining control of the Boiko Towers was of strategic importance and, as a result, Russia lost the ability to use them for military purposes,” GUR said on Telegram.

“Russia has been deprived of the ability to fully control the waters of the Black Sea, and this makes Ukraine many steps closer to regaining Crimea,” it said.

The GUR said troops also captured other “valuable trophies” such as helicopter munitions and a radar system that can track the movement of ships in the Black Sea, it said.

It comes as Kyiv said that its troops had also regained more territory on the southern and eastern frontlines as it pushes on with its counteroffensive to reclaim land occupied by Russian forces. The deputy defence minister Hanna Maliar said in televised comments that Ukraine had retaken nearly two square kilometres of land around the devastated – and Moscow-occupied – eastern city of Bakhmut, the scene for some of the fiercest fighting of the war. Ukrainian troops have regained control of about 49 square km near Bakhmut since the start of the counteroffensive in early June, Ms Maliar said.

Ukrainian troops near the eastern frontline town of Avdiivka took advantage of Russian forces focusing on one part of the battlefield to advance and capture part of the village of Opytne south of the city, the head of the local military administration said.

“In my opinion, this is very significant,” Vitaliy Barabash told national television. “To be frank, the enemy overlooked this southern direction a bit.” He called the advance a “thunderous assault operation”.

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Ukraine’s military also said that Russia could launch a big mobilisation campaign soon to try to recruit hundreds of thousands of soldiers from inside Russia and occupied Ukraine. The Ukrainian General Staff provided no evidence in a statement to support its assertion. Russian officials have said there are no current plans for a new wave of mobilisation and that Moscow is focused on recruiting professional soldiers.

“A mass forced mobilisation of the population is expected soon in the Russian Federation and temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine due to the occupiers’ catastrophic losses,” the General Staff said in a battlefield roundup.

The mobilisation campaign could target between 400,000 and 700,000 recruits, it said, citing different estimates.

In Kyiv, the German foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, said during that Ukraine’s place was in the European Union, but urged it do more to fight corruption.

At meetings with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and other Ukrainian officials, she also heard calls for Western partners to provide Kyiv with more weapons including long-range missiles to fight Russian forces. Ukrainian foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, said he had called for Taurus cruise missiles to be delivered to Ukraine as soon as possible.

“You will do it anyway, its just a matter of time, and I don’t understand why we are wasting time,” Mr Kuleba said.

Reuters and Associated Press contributed to this report

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