Electricity supplies from Ukraine to Crimea have been entirely shut off after the region’s two remaining power pylons were blown up.
Advertisement
One prominent Tatar, Mustafa Djemilev, a member of Ukraine’s parliament, said the partisans would allow access only for crews sent to fix pylons that serve only Ukrainian territory, not Russian-held Crimea.
Crimea’s First Vice-Premier Mikhail Sheremet said that, if the power is not reconnected, the peninsula has enough fuel to continue producing electricity for 30 days, TASS reported.
The Ukrainian government said on Monday it has made a decision to temporarily suspend the movements of cargos across the contact line between Ukraine’s southern Kherson region and the Crimean peninsula.
It was not immediately clear who destroyed the main electric pylons on Friday and Sunday, but the blasted away stump of at least one near the demonstrators was wrapped in the distinctive Crimean Tatar flag, blue with a yellow trident in the upper left-hand corner.
Though Russian Federation is preparing undersea cables to deliver power to the Crimean peninsula, Ukraine still provides Crimea with its electricity.
The ministry is planning to complete the construction of the “bridge” by 2018, and expects its capacity to exceed the peninsula’s projected energy needs by 45 percent, the paper added.
The head of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, declared Monday a non-working day because of the emergency situation in the republic.
The leadership of both the Crimean Tatars, forced into exile by Russian Federation, and a right-wing nationalist group, Right Sector, endorsed the destruction without claiming responsibility.
Public transport is still running and Crimean hospitals are using generators.
The Russian-backed Crimean government has already said it fears the state of emergency could last until late December, when Russia will finally be able to trial its energy link with Crimea, which is now under construction.
Crimea’s small Tartar community has accused Russian Federation of using repression since Moscow took over the peninsula. Previously, the government of Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has largely followed a strategy of trying to minimize direct tension between Crimea and the rest of Ukraine with the hope that Kyiv’s successful Eurointegration policies and other reforms would entice locals to want to return to Ukraine.
Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, which is based in Crimea, was not affected by the power outage, the Interfax news agency reported, citing a fleet spokesman.
Advertisement
According to the energy ministry, the explosion has left 1,896,000 people without power.
