Ukraine knocks out power in Russian-occupied Crimea

**Nick Miles** (0:00)
This is The Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Nick Miles, and at 14 Hours GMT on Wednesday, the 24th of June, these are our main stories. Ukraine steps up its campaign on Russian-occupied Crimea as energy facilities are hit. Red alerts are in place across a number of countries as temperatures continue to soar across parts of Western Europe. The US Senate has approved a measure demanding that President Donald Trump halt the war in Iran or seek congressional approval before continuing military action.
Also in this podcast, do you ever find yourself fading throughout the day?

**Kaz Ahmed** (0:40)
The study basically showed that a break every hour showed a good improvement in productivity, reduced fatigue ability through the day, and also an improvement in workers' mental health.

**Nick Miles** (0:49)
How movement snacking may help.
Ukraine has long been outgunned and outmanned in its conflict with Russia. But overnight into Wednesday, we got another clear sign about where Kyiv excels. Drone warfare. The latest Ukrainian strikes on the biggest city in Russian-occupied Crimea, Sevastopol, have left it completely without electricity. The authorities have been forced to suspend fuel sales to the public. These people in Crimea have told the BBC how they're coping.

**SPEAKER_4** (1:22)
Things have got worse since the start of the month. I ordered a generator yesterday and I'm going to pick it up today.

**Pierre-Antoine Denis** (1:29)
The funny thing is that now fuel sales have been suspended.

**SPEAKER_4** (1:33)
There's nothing to power it with.

**Mark Pointing** (1:35)
Since yesterday, the petrol stations have been sitting empty. The fuel is there, but they're not selling it. Deliverers arrived overnight and normally sales would start during the day. But after Crimean Governor Xionov's decree, everything was shut down. I managed to fill up my tank recently.
So now I'm trying to save fuel and avoid using the car unless I really have to.

**Nick Miles** (1:55)
Ukraine has been stepping up attacks on energy infrastructure in areas illegally held by Russia to damage Moscow's oil revenues. I heard more about that strategy from our Europe correspondent Nick Beek, who's in Kyiv.

**Nick Beek** (2:07)
Sevastopol is important for the Russians strategically, logistically, also symbolically, because it is the biggest city in Crimea and the authorities there, the Moscow-installed authorities are saying, yes, there is this power outage. They've talked about suspending electric transport there. They've told people not to panic and they say that their engineers are trying to get things back to normal as soon as possible. But clearly this Ukrainian tactic, this strategy of drones is working. We've heard from the drone unit, as it were. They said that this operation overnight was highly successful and it is part of this wider theme the Ukrainians trying to hit Russia itself as well as Russian-occupied land.

**Nick Miles** (2:49)
And specifically the significance of Crimea for Russia and Ukraine. It has a special place for both countries, doesn't it?

**Nick Beek** (2:58)
Yeah, absolutely. Crimea illegally annexed by the Russians back in 2014
Also for President Putin, it's hugely important to him. And we've seen the Ukrainians hit particularly the Kurtz Bridge, which again holds a special place, you could say in President Putin's heart, this land bridge that he was there for the inauguration of it when it was opened. And it served not just as a symbolic value, but also it brings in supplies from Russia itself. And it really is a key artery for the Russian war effort. So the Ukrainians are really pounding this particular part of the world. And it does seem to be having an effect. You've got Vladimir Putin talking about this being a Ukrainian effort to destabilize the population. And in recent days, we've seen suggestions that there could be a ban on the export of diesel from Russia itself. And some Russian newspapers talking about them having to import fuel. So really this would be a huge change if the Russians are having to recalibrate the whole way they deal with fuel.

**Nick Miles** (4:03)
There is no suggestion that Ukraine might attempt to retake Crimea. That would be extremely difficult, I imagine. But to what extent is what we're seeing now? Ukraine trying to perhaps gain leverage for some kind of negotiation later on down the line.

**Nick Beek** (4:20)
Yes, I think that is really the case. In terms of incrementally or suddenly taking back land, that's just not on the table at the moment. But I think it's kind of threefold really what the Ukrainians are trying to do. There's an immediate destabilization. And so for people living in those areas, they're clearly going to be unhappy with what's happening in their daily lives with a lack of power. Also hitting Moscow's war chest, the oil revenues are down. But also this pressure on Vladimir Putin as well.