Bombing of dam ‘a new low’ for Russia

Russia was accused of destroying a dam to slow Ukraine’s counter-offensive on Tuesday in what Rishi Sunak said would be a “new low” by Moscow. 

Torrents of flood water burst through the Nova Kakhovka dam on the Dnipro river, forcing the evacuation of tens of thousands of civilians and leaving swathes of the front line underwater.

The destruction came a day after Kyiv launched multiple attacks across the front line for the apparent beginning of its long-awaited counter-offensive.

Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, said Russian troops had previously mined the dam and pressed the trigger at 2.50am.

The explosion was the “largest man-made disaster in Europe for decades”, he said.

Speaking on Tuesday night, Mr Sunak said: “Our military and intelligence agencies are currently looking at it so it’s too soon to preempt that and make a definitive judgement.

“But what I can say is if it is intentional it would represent the largest attack on civilian infrastructure in Ukraine since the start of the war, and would demonstrate the new lows we have seen from Russian aggression. 

“Attacks on civilian infrastructure are appalling and wrong. We’ve seen previous instances of that in the conflict so far. But it’s too early to be definitive.”

US intelligence was “leaning” to the conclusion that Russia had triggered the flood, NBC news reported on Tuesday evening.

James Cleverly, the UK’s Foreign Secretary, suggested that Russia was behind the “abhorrent act”, saying “intentionally attacking exclusively civilian infrastructure is a war crime”.

Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, accused Moscow of carrying out the strike “to stop the Ukrainian offensive”.

Russia blamed Ukraine for the destruction of the dam, terming it an act of “sabotage” that endangered water supplies to Russian-controlled Crimea.

The Nova Kakhovka dam and its hydro-electric power plant powered three million homes. The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, around 150km upstream, also used water from it to cool its reactors.

A statement released by the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency said there was no immediate safety risk at the plant.

More than 17,000 people were due to be evacuated, while Ukraine warned 25,000 residents stranded in Russian-occupied territories were also in danger.

Emergency services in Russian-held territories said about 80 towns could be affected by the flooding.

“In all my years I’ve never seen anything like it”, Vita Lozynska, a Kherson resident, told The Telegraph. “Trees, cars everything else being carried along by the flood.”

Swans were pictured swimming around Nova Kakhovka’s administrative building while beavers were seen in the streets of downstream Kherson.

Mykhailo Podolyak, a Ukrainian presidential aide, said the dam’s collapse would “create obstacles for the offensive actions of the Ukrainian armed forces”.

The flooding would be likely to hinder the movement of Ukrainian heavy armour as Kyiv’s armed forces attempt to push south towards Crimea, which was illegally annexed by Moscow in 2014.

But a Ukrainian military official told the Financial Times the country’s military would simply adjust plans for their offensive to avoid muddy bogs created by the flooding.

Moscow’s forces are also likely to be impacted after its troops were pictured wading through a flooded area on the occupied bank of the Dnipro.

Some experts suggested that Russian mismanagement of the dam could have caused the disaster, pointing to the failure to open sluice gates sufficiently and an unprecedentedly high level of water in the reservoir.

The dam was damaged by a possible Ukrainian missile strike in late October and a suspected Russian explosion on Nov 11. A road over it was washed away on June 2, according to satellite imagery, which could point to broader structural failings.

Oleksii Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s Security Council, said the dam was blown up by Russia’s 205th Motorised Rifle Brigade.

Andriy Yermak, chief of staff to Mr Zelensky, said: “We know that Russian troops had mined the hydroelectric station in the early days of the full-scale invasion, so the pre-meditated blast is the only plausible explanation. Any alternative theories are nothing less than false Russian propaganda narratives.”

Dmitri Peskov, a Kremlin spokesman, blamed the destruction on Ukrainian forces, branding it a “sabotage” attack that would have “grave consequences” for tens of thousands of residents.

But Ukraine’s Western allies stood behind Kyiv and promised to help the government repair the damage caused by the flooding.

Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission’s president, said: “Russia will have to pay for the war crimes committed in Ukraine.”

Josep Borrell, the EU’s top foreign diplomat, condemned the attack in the “strongest terms possible”, adding: “The destruction of the Kakhovka dam represents a new dimension of Russian atrocities, putting the lives of hundreds of thousands of civilians at risk.”

John Kirby, the White House’s national security spokesman, said the US was assessing claims Russia was behind the dam burst but could not not say “conclusively” who was responsible.

He added that the US had enough funds to support Ukraine on the battlefield for the rest of the fiscal year.

The White House was open to asking Congress for more money if it was determined that Ukraine needed “supplemental funding” to deal with the clean-up from the flooding, he said.

Mr Kirby’s comments came after, Kevin McCarthy, the Republican House Speaker, warned that he would block any further US spending packages on Ukraine.