The Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) established the chronology of the seizure of the Kakhovska HPP and the blowing up of the North Crimean Canal.
The SSU reported this on August 17.
It was possible to identify two soldiers of the Russian Federation who gave criminal orders. This is the deputy commander of the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Federation for logistics, Major General Mikhail Yasnikov, and the commander of the 11th separate engineering brigade, Colonel Dmitry Markov. They directly commanded the seizure of the Kakhovska HPP and the blowing up of the North Crimean Canal.
Their actions negatively affected the water supply of the region, the operation of the irrigation system of the Kherson oblast, caused significant damage to the environment and particularly large material losses to Ukraine.
The SSU investigators found out that Major General Yasnikov gave orders for the illegal seizure of both critical infrastructure facilities, while Colonel Markov directed the detonations.
They are suspected of violating the laws and customs of war. Investigators established that on February 24, the Russian military, using heavy weapons:
- seized the administrative buildings and facilities of the Kakhovska HPP and took the personnel hostage;
- made it impossible for the hydroelectric power station to function normally;
- destroyed the highway bridge, depriving the object of vital logistics;
- carried out a series of detonations of the structures of the North Crimean Canal in order to supply Dnipro water to the temporarily occupied Crimea.
- In March 2014, Ukraine stopped supplying Dnipro water to the Crimean Peninsula. In September 2015, activists organized a trade blockade of Crimea, and at the end of the same year they achieved a complete shutdown of electricity supplies to the temporarily occupied peninsula. Before the annexation, Ukraine provided up to 85% of fresh water from the Dnipro to Crimea. Ukraine has declared that it will not restore water supply until the deoccupation of Crimea.