Russian forces are attacking dams in Ukraine in order to flood Ukrainian military crossing points amid concerns about battlefield setbacks, UK intelligence has said.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) said in its daily briefing that the strikes were “unlikely to have caused significant disruption to Ukrainian operations due to the distance between the damaged dams and the combat areas”.
It said Russian forces struck the Penchenihy dam on the Siverskyy Donets River with ballistic missiles or similar weapons on Wednesday and Thursday after striking a dam near Krivyy Rih in central Ukraine the previous week.
The MoD said: “Ukrainian forces are advancing further downstream along both rivers. As Russian commanders become increasingly concerned about their operational setbacks, they are probably attempting to strike the sluice gates of dams, in order to flood Ukrainian military crossing points.”
Latest Defence Intelligence update on the situation in Ukraine - 24 September 2022
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It comes as thousands of people are attempting to leave Russia to neighbouring countries to avoid conscription.
Long queues were reported at Finland’s south-eastern border with Russia on Friday with the number of Russians heading into the Nordic country more than doubling from a week ago.
Similar scenes were reported at the border with Kazakhstan, which has also seen an increased number of arrivals from Russia.
The exodus came after the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, announced a conscription drive this week to send more troops to fight in the war in Ukraine.
Border guards in Finland said about 7,000 people entered from Russia on Thursday, around 6,000 of them Russian. This was an increase of 107 per cent compared with the same day a week earlier, and the numbers are steadily rising.
Finnish land border crossings are one of the few entry points into Europe for Russians after a string of countries shut their airspace to Russian planes in response to Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
