Russia shells Ukraine energy facilities with high-precision missiles
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Russia escalates in light of the Ukrainian provocations, striking the Ukrainian energy infrastructure in retaliation.
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Russian 3M-14 Kalibr (SS-N-30A) launch (Russian MoD)
The Russian army launched a barrage of high-precision missiles on Ukrainian energy facilities, as well as military command hubs, dealing heavy damage to the Ukrainian energy and military infrastructure, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Sunday.
"The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation continued to carry out strikes with long-range high-precision air-launched weapons on military command and control facilities and the energy infrastructure of Ukraine," the defense ministry announced.
"The targets of the strikes were reached. All designated targets were hit," Moscow added.
Concurrently, Russia strengthened the security of the Kherson region's Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant in order to dodge any attempted provocations waged by Ukraine, the deputy head of the Kherson region's administration, Kirill Stremousov, told Russian news agency Sputnik.
"There is a strong group of troops standing there. It will not be easy to break through there," he said following reports about Ukrainian troops pondering breaking through the dam to flood the territories and cross the Dnieper River powering the Kakhovka power plant.
Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov underlined earlier in the week that the energy infrastructure had become a target for terrorists, citing accidents at the Nord Stream pipelines as an example of this.
"Energy is what develops us … energy is what becomes a target for the criminal actions of terrorists, as we saw with [Nord] Stream [pipelines] and energy is what the future of all mankind, including our country, is connected with," he said.
Read next: Kremlin: Energy has become target for terrorists
The Russian armed forces have been conducting a vicious campaign over the past week, which has seen Moscow shelling Ukraine and carrying out drone strikes, causing air raids to blare throughout the country and leading to a highly tense atmosphere.
Russia carried out strikes against infrastructure critical for the Ukrainian military throughout the week, which happened to include facilities related to energy and connectivity.
Russian President Vladimir Putin explained the debacle by underlining that his country would not leave without response to the crimes Kiev committed against Russian civilian infrastructure, primarily the explosion that took place on the Crimean bridge.
The Russian National Anti-Terrorist Committee reported last week that a truck exploded on the Crimean Bridge early in the morning.
Read next: Russia's State Duma: Crimea Bridge blast "declaration of war"
"Ukrainian vandals managed to reach the Crimean Bridge with their bloody hands. They now have something to be proud of: for 23 years of their management, they failed to build anything worthy of attention in Crimea, but they managed to damage the canvas of the Russian bridge," said Vladimir Konstantinov, head of the Crimean parliament.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in August that the country would return to "Russian-occupied Crimea" whichever way it sees fit, without consulting with other countries.
