DISINFO: Ukraine wants to blow up the Kakhovka dam to block water supply to Crimea
SUMMARY
Ukraine wants to blow Kakhovka dam in Ukraine. Such an event would cause the river to flood, sweeping away some 80 settlements and cutting off freshwater supply lines to Crimea for years to come.
RESPONSE
No evidence given. Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narratives about false flag operations. Such claims are a part of a broader pro-Kremlin disinformation campaign accompanying the full scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, trying to place the blame on Ukraine.
Ukrainian military intelligence said on the 21st of October that Russia had conducted the main mining works of the dam back in April, but warned that the floodgates and supports of the dam were further primed in the past week. Two military vehicles full of explosives were placed on the road that crosses the dam, the agency added.
The 30 metre-high dam, which holds back 18m cubic metres of water, straddles the Dnipro River upstream from Russian-held Kherson and is about 20 miles from advancing Ukrainian forces hoping to recapture both it and the occupied city.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, has accused Russia of plotting to blow up the two-mile Nova Kakhovka dam in the south of the country, warning its destruction would cause “a large-scale disaster” affecting towns and cities.
According to Ukrainian Military Intelligence Chief Kyrylo Budanov Russia will slow Ukrainian troops' advance in the south by two weeks if it blows up the vast Kakhovka dam, but such a move would flood territory occupied by Moscow and lose it a vital water source for annexed Crimea.
Blowing up the dam would also "destroy the possibility of the existence of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant because this facility is inextricably linked to it".
The nuclear plant, Europe's largest, has been occupied by Russia for months and is located near the reservoir.
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