Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has claimed that it foiled a Ukrainian attack on the Kerch Bridge connecting Russia with occupied Crimea, claiming that they prevented a car loaded with powerful explosives from reaching the bridge after it had crossed into the North Caucasus from Georgia.
The FSB made the announcement on Monday.
‘It has been established that the car with a high-power homemade explosive device arrived in Russia from Ukraine in transit through a number of countries’, the FSB said, according to state news agency TASS.
The bridge, widely viewed in Ukraine as a symbol of Russia’s illegal occupation of Crimea, has been repeatedly hit by Ukrainian attacks, but has nonetheless remained standing.
The FSB said the explosives were ‘carefully concealed’ in a Chevrolet Volt, and that all those involved in its delivery to Russia were detained. They have not announced the identities or nationalities of those allegedly transporting the explosives.
Footage from the FSB published by TASS shows the police apprehending at least two individuals by the Chevrolet, which carries a Georgian transit license plate. Two temporary Polish license plates can be seen placed on the car’s front.
According to the FSB, the car had allegedly crossed into Russia through the Upper Lars checkpoint with Georgia, and was to be delivered to Krasnodar Krai, where it was intended to be handed over to another driver, who would not be aware of the car’s contents and would have become an ‘unwitting suicide bomber whom the Kyiv regime planned to use in the dark’.
The FSB added that this was Ukraine’s second attempt at sabotaging the bridge, having previously foiled another plot in April after capturing a minivan loaded with 500 kilogrammes of explosives on the Belarus–Poland border.
Georgia has not issued any statements on the allegations as of publication.
In October 2022, less than a year into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russian law enforcement arrested an Armenian and declared two Georgians persons of interest in an investigation into an explosion that severely damaged the bridge earlier that month.
At the time, Russia alleged that explosives responsible for the incident were transported into Russia through Georgia and Armenia.
Georgia has denied Russia’s accusations, claiming they were not supported by evidence, and saying that no explosives had crossed Georgia’s border. The Georgian government said that it would only launch an investigation if ‘someone substantiates’ the claim.
In 2023, Georgian authorities claimed to have seized 14 kilogrammes of explosives being transported by a group of Ukrainians, Georgians, and Armenians through Georgia to Russia.
Bacha Mgeladze, the director of the counter-terrorism department of Georgia’s State Security Service (SSG), said at the time that the explosives were bound for Voronezh in southwestern Russia.
The authorities had confiscated C-4, military-grade explosives, that could have caused ‘significant damage to infrastructure and large-scale casualties’, Mgeladze added.
Nate Ostiller
