Putin says Ukraine special services behind Crimea bridge blast; Russia’s FSB detained 8 suspects
- Saturday’s explosion destroyed a section of the Crimea Bridge, temporarily halting road traffic
- Russia’s FSB security service detains five Russians and three citizens of Ukraine and Armenia
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that Ukraine’s special services were behind an attack that damaged the Crimean Bridge last Saturday.
Russia has detained eight suspects over the deadly explosion of the bridge linking annexed Crimea to Russia, the FSB security service said in a statement quoted by news agencies on Wednesday.
The suspects include five Russians and “three Ukrainian and Armenian citizens”, it said, without providing more details.
“The explosives were hidden in 22 plastic film rolls weighing 22,770kg (50,200 pounds),” it said.
The rolls left on a boat in August from the Ukrainian port of Odesa to Bulgaria. They then transited through the port of Poti in Georgia, then sent overland to Armenia before arriving by road in Russia, according to the FSB.
The explosives entered Russia on October 4 in a truck with Georgian number plates and reached the region of Krasnodar on October 6, two days before the blasts, the FSB said.