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Crimea FSB officers detain illegal armed group member storing TNT in weapons cache

The armed group was reportedly involved in energy blockade of Crimea

SIMFEROPOL, December 19./TASS/. Russian FSB officers in Crimea have detained a member of an illegal armed group involved in energy blockade of Crimea and arranging a cache in which 12 kilogram of TNT were found, the FSB said in a report circulated by media on Wednesday.

"The investigation department of the Russian FSB in the Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol has brought charges against a 57-year-old Russian citizen detained as he was entering Crimea on December 12. The man is accused of illegal acquisition, storage and carrying of ammunition and explosives," it said.

It has been established that last spring he arranged in Crimea a cache with ammunition and explosives to use them in Crimea, it said. FSB officers found the cache which contained 12 kilograms of TNT and 200 cartridges, the report said.

According to FSB data, the man was involved in the activity of a nationalist paramilitary group controlled by Lenur Islyamov, the mastermind of an operation to blow up a power transmission line in Ukraine’s Kherson region in 2015.

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