The ministry said that “Russian aircraft destroyed three US high-speed military ships (…) with landing parties of the Armed Forces of Ukraine that were traveling towards the coast of Crimea.”
According to a note published on the messaging site Telegram, the ships were destroyed near Zmiinyi, the so-called Serpent Island, which was occupied at the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine, but which Russia withdrew from in June 2022.
Last week, Russia said it destroyed four military speedboats in the Black Sea carrying Ukrainian soldiers as they sailed towards Cape Tarkankut, west of the Crimean peninsula.
On August 30, the Russian Defense Ministry said it had destroyed four military boats carrying a total of 50 special forces personnel from Kiev, without providing further details.
On August 24, Ukraine announced a rare military operation on the Crimean Peninsula, during which the Ukrainian flag was symbolically raised.
According to Ukrainian military intelligence, Ukrainian special forces units arrived from the sea, landing in the west of the peninsula before withdrawing “without loss”.
On August 22, Russia announced it had “destroyed” a speedboat carrying Ukrainian soldiers near Serpent Island, the same day it said it had destroyed a spy ship.
Also today, in other news, the Russian Defense Ministry said that air defense systems shot down eight Ukrainian drones flying over the Black Sea near the Crimean Peninsula this morning.
“An attempt by the Kiev regime to carry out a terrorist attack with unmanned aerial vehicles (…) against facilities on the territory of the Russian Federation was foiled,” the ministry said in a telegram.
In total, “eight unmanned aerial vehicles in service in Black Sea waters near the coast of the Republic of Crimea were destroyed by air defense systems,” the note said.
Ukraine said it was the target of 32 drone strikes this morning, mainly targeting the capital Kiev, of which 25 were shot down.
In a play published today, the General Staff of the Ukrainian Army said that “the invaders attacked Ukraine with 32 suicide drones of the Iranian-made Shahed-136/131 type.”
Debris from downed drones damaged cars, cables from Kiev’s trams and an apartment building, where one person was injured but his life was not in danger, the Kiev military administration said in a Telegram.
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