The Russians are trying to frame strikes on Russian military facilities in Crimea as acts of terrorism to divert attention from their violation of international law and undermine calls to declare Russia a state sponsor of terrorism.
That follows from a statement by the American Institute for the Study of War (ISW) in its daily report.
Military analysts write that Russian officials are likely to increasingly link attacks by Ukrainian special forces in occupied territories to operations by organizations linked to Islamist extremism in an attempt to distance the Ukrainian special forces movement from the international community and undermine Ukraine's appeals to officially recognize Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism.
It is noted that attacks on legitimate Russian military facilities are fully within the legal use of force and are not terrorist acts, and there is no evidence that these attacks were committed by extremists.
As earlier reported, the FSB of Russia reported on the detention in Dzhankoi and Yalta of the occupied Crimea of six members-citizens of the Russian Federation of the Islamic organization Hizb ut-Tahrir, which is banned in the territory of Russia.
According to report, they were apparently acting on instructions from Ukraine. The so-called "head" of Crimea Sergey Aksyonov called them "terrorists."
As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, earlier on August 16, a series of explosions were registered in Dzhankoi district of the temporarily occupied Crimea.
The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, commenting on this incident, announced a fire at the temporary ammunition storage site.
At the same time, the Russian agency, in its characteristic manner, called the detonation of ammunition as a result of their "ignition" the cause of the explosions.
As earlier reported, on August 9, a series of explosions took place in the territory of the Russian military airfield in the west of the temporarily occupied Crimea, as a result of which nine aircraft and ammunition were destroyed.
As Western media reported with reference to an anonymous Ukrainian official, a unit of the Special Operations Forces of the Ukrainian Armed Forces was involved in the explosions at the airfield.
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