Ukraine may enter occupied Crimea by late spring, says intelligence chief
Kyrylo Budanov (Photo:Oleksandr Medvedev/NV)
Ukraine’s army could start to liberate Ukraine’s Russian-occupied Crimea by the end of spring, the head of Ukraine’s Military Intelligence Directorate, Kyrylo Budanov, said on Ukrainian national television on Sept. 30.
Budanov said he had grown up in the Crimea and Ukraine would return there “quite soon.”
He said Ukrainian defenders will enter the Crimea “by the end of spring, maybe a little earlier.”
“With weapons... There is no other option,” he said.
The intelligence chief added the war “will not last so long, it will end soon.”
“I’ve never talked about ‘two or three weeks’ (as was claimed by Ukrainian presidential advisor Oleksiy Arestovych),” he said.
“If you remember my statements in late May, I gave the algorithm of actions. I directly said that June, unfortunately, won’t be very good for us, we will lose a bit, there will be a temporary break in July, and in August, we will gradually start a movement to restore our territory... The war will largely subside in the winter. And after the winter, the end of this conflict will begin by (Ukraine reaching) the administrative borders as of 1991, at the first stage.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in August that Russia’s war against Ukraine should end with the liberation of the Crimea, just as it began with its occupation.
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