Ukrainian forces will enter Crimea “soon”—Kyiv intelligence chief

The head of Ukraine’s military intelligence has said that Kyiv’s forces have in their sights the peninsula that Russia seized in 2014.

In an interview with Ukrainian TV channel TSN, Krylo Budanov said that the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) “will soon enter Crimea,” without specifying a timeframe or giving any other details. Newsweek has contacted the Ukrainian Defense Ministry for further comment.

Earlier this month, the Kerch Bridge linking Crimea with the Russian region of Krasnodar was hit by blasts, amid reports that Kyiv’s domestic security service and the Ukrainian Navy were responsible.

This week Ukrainian Security Service head Vasyl Malyuk confirmed Kyiv was behind a blast last October that targeted the bridge which is a symbol of Russian occupation of Crimea.

While regaining the peninsula is a professed war aim for Kyiv, Budanov frequently makes optimistic claims about Ukrainian gains and Russian losses. In September 2022, he said that Ukraine would return to Crimea by the end of spring 2023.

Budanov also said in the interview, reported by Ukrainian media outlets, that he was not concerned about the presence of Wagner mercenaries in Belarus, where they have been exiled following their mutiny against Russia’s military establishment on June 4.

He said that there had been no increase in the number of Russian troops and that “there are as many of them as there were” although mobilization “allows them to constantly replenish the losses they have suffered.”

Budanov’s comments come amid reports of Ukrainian advances in the south of the country towards Crimea, in particular south of Orikhiv in western Zaporizhhia Oblast.

British defense officials said on Saturday that fighting had increased over the last 48 hours in the oblast with hostilities focused near the village of Robotyne, near Orikhiv, against Russia’s 58th Combined Arms Army.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a video this week that the Ukrainian military has liberated the village of Staromaiorske, 50 miles to the east of Orikhiv.

Military analyst Konrad Muzika, director of Rochan Consulting, wrote in a Substack post on Friday that the Orikhiv axis was “the priority” for Ukrainian forces “which was confirmed by the deployment of the 10th Corps.”

“As a result of this change, Ukrainians progressed a few kilometers, but the sustainability of advance is a big concern,” he wrote.

Meanwhile, retired Australian general Mick Ryan wrote on Substack on Friday that “there is still some way to go before Ukrainian ground forces are able to make an operational breakthrough and advance to their southern seacoast.”