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Power line to Crimea damaged: warnings suggest Ukrainian subversion

Investigators and Emergencies Ministry specialists are at the site, cordoned off after the attack overnight to Tuesday

KIEV, October 6. /TASS/. Unidentified attackers have damaged the tower of a Ukrainian electricity transmission line feeding power to Crimea, a senior police spokesman wrote in a Facebook post on Tuesday.

Ilya Kiva, deputy head of police in the southern Kherson region, said investigators and Emergencies Ministry specialists were at the site, cordoned off after the attack overnight to Tuesday.

The line assault follows a warning by supporters of former Crimean Deputy Prime Minister Lenur Islyamov and Ukrainian parliament members Mustafa Dzhemilev and Refat Chubarov on September 20 that a Crimean food blockade would disrupt free passage of trucks carrying supplies. This was supported by extremist group Right Sector, outlawed in Russia.

Chubarov also told journalists that electricity supply to the peninsula could soon be at risk, noting this could happen in October.

Crimea and the peninsula's Russian federal city of Sevastopol declared independence in March last year after a referendum in which nearly 97% of Crimeans and some 96% of Sevastopol voters chose to secede from Ukraine and join the Russian Federation. Russian President Vladimir Putin signed the reunification deals that same month.

Despite the referendum's convincing result, Kiev refuses to recognise Crimea as part of Russia.