12 August 2026
Weekly update on the situation in occupied Crimea on August 12, 2026
Main News of the Week
▶ On August 7, the Ukrainian military struck the Hvardiiske military airfield in temporarily occupied Crimea. Two aviation hangars were hit at once, where the Russians stored and launched Gerbera and Geran strike drones.
▶ On August 9 and 10, Russian security forces raided the houses of Crimean Tatars in several settlements in northern Crimea, as well as conducted searches and detentions in one of the mosques on the southern coast of the peninsula.
▶ The Prosecutor General’s Office of the Russian Federation has recognized the activities of the American Crimean Tatar Foundation, established in 2021 in New York, as undesirable. According to Russian security forces, the organization supports the Defense Forces of Ukraine by providing drones, protective equipment, generators, transport and means of communication.
▶ The health of Crimean political prisoner Yevhen Shved has deteriorated, while the occupation forces charge him of so-called high treason. He is currently being held in pre-trial detention center №2 in Simferopol, where prolonged solitary confinement, as well as physical and psychological pressure, have caused him a skin disease.
Crimes Committed by the Russian Federation
▶ As of 12 August 2026, 316 people in occupied Crimea are subjected to politically motivated criminal prosecution, including 169 Crimean Tatars and 1 Karaite.
▶ A resident of Alupka in Crimea, born in 1971, has been convicted for posting comments on Telegram that allegedly “justified terrorism” and “supported sabotage and terrorist activities”. The so-called court fined him 300,000 roubles and banned him from administering websites, forums, chat rooms and online groups for almost two years.
▶ The Russian occupiers in Crimea have unlawfully detained jeweller Serhii Diachuk in the Simferopol pretrial detention centre on trumped-up charges of “high treason”. They have been concealing the fact of his detention for a long time. A lawyer from Sevastopol Amet Abultairov and his father-in-law Vitalii Shchurov were also convicted in a similar case of “high treason”.
▶ In the temporarily occupied town of Skadovsk, a 50-year-old man has been detained on suspicion of planning a terrorist attack, allegedly on the orders of the Ukrainian security services. Russian security forces reportedly seized a radio-controlled homemade explosive device from him, disguised as a power bank.
The use of occupied Crimea as a springboard for attacks on Ukraine and the militarization of the peninsula
Since Russia launched a full-scale invasion and spread its armed aggression throughout Ukraine, occupied Crimea has been used by Russia as a military base for spreading aggression in various forms. From the peninsula, the occupiers continue to launch attacks on the territory of Ukraine, including on civilian infrastructure.
▶ The Ukrainian Air Force reported that during the past week, the occupiers carried out another series of massive combined attacks on Ukrainian territory. In particular, they launched over 965 strike UAVs of the Shahed, Gerbera, and Italmas types, as well as Parody decoy drones, from various directions, including from the territory of occupied Crimea and the Black Sea. The enemy also launched a X-59/69 guided air-to-ground missile, an Iskander-M/S-400 ballistic missile and 3 3M22 Zircon/P-800 Oniks anti-ship missiles at Ukraine from Crimea and the Black Sea.
The resistance movement of Ukrainian citizens in occupied Crimea
▶ The Yellow Ribbon movement reported that the range of meat and dairy products is being reduced in shops in the village of Chornomorske due to prolonged power blackouts, which make it impossible to maintain the required storage conditions.
The full-scale invasion was marked by a sharp increase in acts of solidarity and resistance by residents of occupied Crimea against the Russian occupiers. Residents of the occupied territories are uniting in resistance movements such as “Yellow Ribbon”, “Zla Mavka”, and “ATESH”, or acting individually.
To suppress the resistance movement of local residents in the temporarily occupied territory of Crimea after February 24, 2022, the occupation administration actively began to persecute and bring Ukrainian citizens to administrative liability under the article on the so-called discreditation of the Russian army.
De-occupation of Crimea is an integral part of ending the war and restoring peace. Ukrainians are doing everything possible to stop the aggressor and protect the entire world from Russia’s criminal actions. Since this is not a local or regional problem, Russia’s aggression poses a threat to the entire world and the international order.