Russia ramped up security on its only bridge to Crimea after a huge blast destroyed sections of it on Saturday.

President Vladimir Putin has now ordered the country’s Federal Security Service (FSB) to oversee the key crossing to the occupied peninsula.

The bridge is also a pivotal symbol of Russia’s annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in 2014 where the blast killed three persons, Russian investigators said.

Officials said work to fix the damaged sections would begin immediately.

Russian Deputy Prime Minister, Marat Khusnullin ordered the destroyed parts of the bridge to be taken down and said divers would begin investigating damage below the waterline on Sunday morning.

Video shared on social media showed a long queue of vehicles at the bridge to leave Crimea towards Russia on Sunday.

Hailed by Russian media as “the construction of the century”, the bridge has been crucial to Russia for the movement of military equipment, ammunition and troops into southern Ukraine.

Since the bridge plays a strategic role in the war, Ukrainian authorities have said it is a legitimate target, as they vow to retake the peninsula.

Ukrainian officials responded with thinly veiled approval to the explosion but have not indicated that their forces were behind the attack.

President Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledged the incident in his nightly address on Saturday, saying: “Today was not a bad day and mostly sunny on our state’s territory. “Unfortunately, it was cloudy in Crimea. Although it was also warm,” he added.

Russian authorities moved swiftly to reopen those parts of the key crossing still intact and said late on Saturday that the bridge had been partially reopened to road and rail traffic.

Speaking on Sunday, the Moscow-appointed governor of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, said rail traffic would continue as normal but the surviving roadway would for now take only light vehicles, while Lorries and buses would be transported by ferry, he added.

The bridge is a vital artery in Moscow’s supply chain to the battlefront in its invasion of Ukraine and to the annexed Crimean territory itself.

President Putin is to hold a meeting of the Russian Security Council on Monday, in what the Kremlin says is a planned event.

Bbc/Adebukola Aluko

 

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