A pedestrian in Yevpatoria uses a torch after authorities limited electricity supplies. Photograph: Alexey Pavlishak\/Reuters<\/p>\n
Since the start of this year, Kyiv has launched its largest sustained air campaign against Crimea<\/a>, targeting both the peninsula and the land and sea transport links connecting it to Russia. Residents are facing the most severe disruption to daily life since its annexation in 2014.<\/p>\n It was the first Russian-controlled region to experience the acute motor fuel shortages that have since spread to Russia. The Kremlin-installed authorities last month declared a state of emergency and temporarily banned sales to private motorists in an effort to preserve supplies for the military and emergency services.<\/p>\n But as Ukrainian drones increasingly targeted the peninsula\u2019s energy infrastructure, the crisis has quickly moved beyond petrol. More than 70% of Crimea\u2019s roughly 2.5 million residents have experienced some form of power outage, according to a Guardian analysis, while many have now gone several consecutive days without electricity or running water.<\/p>\n Interviews with more than a dozen residents across Crimea pointed to a growing sense of abandonment and frustration with both the Russian-installed authorities and Moscow, as Kyiv seeks to turn the peninsula \u201cinto an island\u201d.<\/p>\n Crimea map<\/a><\/p>\n The festivals, summer camps and beach events that once filled Crimea\u2019s season have been cancelled. In their place, long queues for petrol and a daily search for somewhere to shower and charge a phone. \u201cWe\u2019re surviving, not living,\u201d one resident said.<\/p>\n Aleksei, a Crimean native who supported Russia\u2019s annexation of the peninsula in 2014, says his restaurant has been largely empty this summer as tourists stayed away, while shortages and disrupted supply routes have made it increasingly difficult to source fresh produce from outside the peninsula.<\/p>\n \u201cThe authorities kept insisting Crimea was ready for anything. Literally anything. It turns out the authorities failed to prepare for the worst,\u201d he says. \u201cPeople are hunting for fuel like it\u2019s The Hunger Games.\u201d<\/p>\n Cars queuing for fuel in Yevpatoria. Photograph: Alexey Pavlishak\/Reuters<\/p>\n Like others interviewed by the Guardian, Aleksei asked for his surname to be withheld for security reasons. Crimea is home to one of Russia\u2019s most pervasive and repressive security apparatuses that has left many people fearful of speaking openly. Public expressions of dissent are rare.<\/p>\n Comments beneath officials\u2019 social media posts have, however, become flooded with pleas for help from people who say they cannot contact relatives, buy food or cope with the prolonged outages.<\/p>\n \u201cBelogorsk has been without electricity for more than 70 hours, and all we keep getting are promises,\u201d read one of dozens of comments addressed to Crimea\u2019s Russian-installed head, Sergei Aksyonov.<\/p>\n A dark street during a power outage in Yevpatoria. Photograph: Alexey Pavlishak\/Reuters<\/p>\n Local Telegram chats have turned into improvised survival guides, with residents swapping tips on where fuel has just arrived, setting alarms for late-night voucher releases, sharing maps of the shortest queues and informing each other which neighbourhoods still have electricity or running water.<\/p>\n Since it was seized by Russia in 2014 amid the turmoil of Ukraine\u2019s Maidan revolution<\/a>, which ousted the country\u2019s pro-Russian president, Crimea has been transformed into one of the Kremlin\u2019s most strategically important territories.<\/p>\n In 2022, it became the main staging ground for the invasion of southern Ukraine, where Russian forces advanced far more rapidly than in their failed assault on Kyiv. Since the full-scale invasion, its military infrastructure has been used for air attacks and battlefield support. Moscow has also encouraged hundreds of thousands of Russians to settle on the peninsula.<\/p>\n The 2014 annexation \u2013 of what for many Russians is seen as a desirable region of warm weather and beaches \u2013 sent Vladimir Putin\u2019s approval ratings soaring and, for years, annual celebrations marking Crimea\u2019s \u201creturn\u201d served as choreographed displays of Russian military power and national resurgence.<\/p>\n The beach in Yevpatoria. Photograph: Alexey Pavlishak\/Reuters<\/p>\n By targeting Crimea \u2013 long held up by the Kremlin as the crown jewel of Putin\u2019s rule \u2013 Ukraine hopes to strengthen its hand in any future peace negotiations, says Rob Lee, a military analyst and senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.<\/p>\n \u201cUkraine has more leverage in future negotiations than it did before because it can now reliably strike almost any target in Crimea.\u201d<\/p>\n Ukraine has focused its strikes on the main transport routes supplying Crimea, particularly the Novorossiya highway, a key logistics corridor linking the peninsula to Russia\u2019s Rostov region through the occupied cities of Melitopol and Mariupol.<\/p>\n Ukrainian forces struck more than 240 Russian military trucks during the first week of July alone, according to an analysis of verified strike footage by the French open-source intelligence analyst Cl\u00e9ment Molin.<\/p>\n More recently, Ukraine has escalated its campaign against Russian shipping in the Sea of Azov. Over the last week, Kyiv\u2019s military said it had struck<\/a> 90 vessels used by Russia to supply the occupied peninsula.<\/p>\n In a recent interview with the independent Russian journalist Dmitry Kolezev, an unnamed Russian general said Ukraine\u2019s recent successes were partly the result of Moscow diverting resources away from defending Crimea and towards its offensive in the Donbas.<\/p>\n Fuel storage tanks burning after an attack in Kerch, Crimea, last month. Photograph: Vantor\/Reuters<\/p>\n With the military leadership fixated on capturing the remaining parts of the Donbas, the general said, Crimea had slipped to \u201cthird or fourth\u201d on Russia\u2019s list of priorities.<\/p>\n Lee says Ukraine has succeeded in producing large numbers of medium- and long-range drones, making it increasingly difficult for Russia to defend against them all. \u201cThe cost of these drones is low enough that it\u2019s not prohibitively expensive for Ukraine to keep launching these attacks,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n![\"Ukraine](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Ukraine_releases_drone_footage_showing_attacks_on_energy_sites_in_Russian_held_Crimea___loop--e978e6.jpeg\")
Ukraine releases drone footage showing attacks on energy sites in Russian\u2011held Crimea<\/p>\n