Ukrainians have reacted with a mix of concern and mock to the narrative pushed by the Kremlin and Russian state media that Ukraine was behind Friday’s terrorist attack at a Moscow concert hall, a claim made despite the Islamic State claiming responsibility.
“This is a typical provocation,” said 24-year-old Iryna Blakyta, a resident of Kiev, on Monday. “It’s typical of Russia.” She said Russian President Vladimir Putin would use the attack to create a flag rally effect against Ukraine after greater than two years of war that devastated the Russian population. “He needs to mobilize people,” Blakyta said. “He must show who the enemy is.”
That concern was palpable Monday morning in Kiev, which was targeted with two ballistic missiles in broad daylight, marking the third air attack on the Ukrainian capital in five days. The university constructing in the central a part of the city was reduced to rubble by the attack, and authorities said no less than 10 people were injured.
Ukrainian officials said Putin’s allusions that Ukraine was involved in the attack were consistent with the Kremlin’s long-standing practice of sowing disinformation to cover up the failings of its security services.
“Putin is a pathological liar” – Dmytro Kuleba, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, wrote on X on Sunday, listing a series of bombings, murders and aggressive actions by Russia that he said were cloaked in lies, including Russia’s illegal occupation of Crimea in 2014 and the shooting down of a passenger plane over Ukraine by Kremlin-backed militants the same yr.
“Don’t be fooled by Putin and his supporters,” Kuleba said.
Putin said in statement about the attack wherein no less than 137 people died, that the suspects “are heading towards Ukraine” and that “according to preliminary information, a window has been prepared for them on the Ukrainian side to cross the state border.”
However, Andriy Yusov, a representative of Ukraine’s military intelligence, ridiculed this claim over the weekend, saying that the Ukraine-Russian border is an lively combat zone wherein each side are heavily mined and guarded, making any border crossing extremely complicated. and dangerous.
“You don’t have to be a security expert” to know this, Yusov added On Saturday, Ukrainian television.
He and other officials identified that Russia had used previous terrorist attacks to escalate conflicts abroad and further strengthen its domestic security apparatus. A series of bombings on apartment buildings in Russia in 1999 sparked the second of two post-Soviet wars in Chechnya, and Putin used the murderous school siege in 2004 to justify his clampdown on political freedoms.
Some Ukrainian officials and analysts stated that Russia’s attempts responsible Ukraine may very well be used to create grounds for expanding military conscription. In recent months, Russia has occupied several towns and villages in Ukraine, but at a big human cost, so replenishing forces has change into crucial.
“Their only goal is to motivate more Russians to die in their senseless and criminal war against Ukraine,” Kuleba said.
Mykola Dawidyuk, a Ukrainian political analyst, said Putin desired to portray Ukraine as a “cruel enemy” linked to terrorism with a purpose to arouse “aggressive attitudes toward Ukraine” amongst Russians.
But he added that Ukrainians “don’t care” about this narrative because they’ve long been accustomed to the Kremlin’s misrepresentations of the conflict, including Putin’s false claim that Ukraine is ruled by neo-Nazi leaders and that the war is geared toward denazifying the country.
For now, people in Ukraine were wondering whether Putin would use the terrorist attack to justify more deadly attacks on Ukraine. “He has to constantly come up with reasons to keep everything under control,” Blakyta said.
On Monday, around 10:30 a.m., Kyiv residents were surprised by a series of loud explosions that occurred lower than a minute after an air raid alert was announced in the capital, forcing people to run into the streets in quest of shelter.
The Ukrainian Air Force said it intercepted two ballistic missiles fired from Crimea, but falling debris destroyed a university gymnasium. “Fortunately, no one was inside because it was closed,” said Kiev Mayor Vitali Klitschko during a visit to the strike site.
Nearby, investigators were busy collecting and marking rocket debris to rigorously analyze and determine what sort of weapon was used. Because the missiles flew into Kiev quickly after the alert was raised, there was speculation that Russia had used one in all its powerful hypersonic missiles, which fly at several times the speed of sound.
All that remained of the university was an enormous pile of bricks, twisted metal structures and cracked concrete slabs. Nearby cars were covered in a thick layer of dust, and native people, still shocked by what had happened, watched as rescuers and firefighters cleaned up the debris.
“A column of smoke and mud rose up like in a fog. Then sirens, rescue vehicles, emergency services, said 30-year-old Evelina Korzhova, standing in her flower shop opposite the destroyed constructing. As a results of the explosion, the store’s window was shattered.
In his evening address on Sunday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that over the past week, Russia had fired about 190 missiles, 140 attack drones and 700 aerial bombs towards Ukraine.
Oleksandra Mykolyshyn AND Daria Mitiuk reporting contributed.
