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Russia's security service airs video of operation to detain alleged Ukrainian saboteurs

The FSB reported earlier that alleged members of Ukrainian defense ministry’s sabotage group in Sevastopol, who are suspected of plotting acts of sabotage in Crimea, were detained

MOSCOW, November 10. /TASS/. Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has aired a video, showing a group of alleged Ukrainian saboteurs detained in Crimea’s Sevastopol on Wednesday and weapons as well as explosives seized from them.

Earlier in the day, the FSB public relations center told TASS that a group of alleged saboteurs from the Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s chief intelligence directorate had been detained in Sevastopol. The group is suspected of plotting acts of sabotage at Crimea’s military facilities, it said.

The FSB said it had seized powerful explosive devices, weapons and rounds of ammunition, means of special communications and also maps of facilities to be targeted by the acts of sabotage.

As the footage goes, one of the suspects was detained in the street by FSB officers. After that he was taken handcuffed to the apartment where he lived, where weapons were found as well as blank pieces of paper with stamps of military unit A0235 of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry and a souvenir plate produced to mark the 20th anniversary of the same military unit.

According to open sources, military unit A0235 of Ukraine’s Navy had been stationed in Sevastopol before Crimea and Sevastopol reunited with Russia.

Chevrons of Ukrainian military units, swabs, a visiting card of the Right Sector (Ukraine’ extremist organization outlawed in Russia), as well as camouflage uniforms were also found in the apartment. Besides, the video showed FSB officers withdrawing supposedly explosives from a cache in the ground.

Three people were detained all in all and taken into custody. A source from Crimean law enforcement agencies identified them as Dmitry Shtyblikov, Alexei Bessarabov and Vladimir Dudko.

On August 10, Russia’s FSB announced the detention of a group of saboteurs and the deterrence of planned terrorist attacks on the Crimean Peninsula that had been plotted by Ukraine’s main intelligence directorate. The aborted terror attempts were designed to target Crimea’s critical infrastructure and vital facilities, the FSB said. The detained men - Andrei Zakhtey and Yevgeny Panov - admitted their guilt and were arrested. In early October, the Kievsky district court in Simferopol extended their custody until December 10.