26 August 2026
Weekly update on the situation in occupied Crimea on August 26, 2026
Main news of the week
▶ On the night of August 23, the Defense Forces of Ukraine struck a site used by Russian forces to launch and store unmanned surface vessels. A ground-based relay station used to control Geran and Gerbera strike drones was also hit at the same location.
▶ In the village of Vidradne in the Bakhchysarai district, Russian security forces are conducting door-to-door inspections and searching garages under the pretext of “looking for caches and materials for drones”. These searches are being used as a tool to intimidate the population, increase pressure, and create the image of an “internal enemy”.
▶ The health condition of Crimean political prisoner Rustem Murasov has deteriorated critically. As a result of prolonged detention in a punishment cell (SHIZO) and a high-security barracks, he has lost significant weight and suffers from hypertension, while the prison administration is failing to provide him with the necessary medication.
▶ 58-year-old Crimean political prisoner Lenur Khalilov, who has been diagnosed with liver cancer with metastases as well as several other serious chronic illnesses, is not receiving adequate medical care in Russian detention. Instead of the treatment he requires, he is being given only a strong opioid painkiller at a prison hospital in the Arkhangelsk region in the Russian Federation.
Crimes committed by the Russian Federation
▶ As of August 26, 2026, 316 people in occupied Crimea are subjected to politically motivated criminal persecution, including 169 Crimean Tatars and 1 Karaite.
▶ In Yevpatoria, a 23-year-old local resident was arrested on charges of “high treason” for allegedly collecting information about facilities of the Russian Ministry of Defense and the residential addresses of Russian military personnel for the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU).
▶ Russian security forces detained a 28-year-old resident of the village of Zaprudne on charges of organizing the activities of a Jehovah’s Witnesses congregation. Russia designated the Jehovah’s Witnesses as “extremist” and banned it in 2017, subsequently extending the application of its legislation to the occupied territories.
▶ Ukrainian serviceman Seiran Asanov, whom an occupation court unlawfully sentenced to 20 years’ imprisonment for serving in the Noman Chelebidzhikhan Battalion, was transferred to the Russian Vladimir Central Prison to serve his sentence.
▶ A resident of Foros in temporarily occupied Crimea was arrested and accused of espionage for allegedly establishing contact with the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine and sending via messenger an information about the locations of FSB facilities for planning sabotage operations and missile strikes.
▶ The whereabouts of Heorhii Levchenko, the convicted administrator of the Telegram channel of the RIA-Pivden media outlet, are currently unknown. Russia sentenced him to 16 years’ imprisonment on so-called high treason charges.
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 1005 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 9 Kh-59/AS-17 Krypton guided air-to-ground missiles and 2 P-800 Oniks anti-ship missiles at Ukraine from occupied Crimea and the Black Sea.
▶ At the so-called Crimean Tatar Museum of Cultural and Historical Heritage, the occupiers held a propaganda event marking the Russian State Flag Day, cynically exploiting a Crimean Tatar cultural institution to impose Russian narratives.
The resistance movement of Ukrainian citizens in occupied Crimea
▶ On Ukrainian National Flag Day, activists of the Yellow Ribbon resistance movement raised the Ukrainian flag on Mount Kishka in Simeiz.
▶ A severe fuel shortage persists on the temporarily occupied Crimean Peninsula, including in Sevastopol, resulting in strict restrictions at petrol stations – selling petrol and diesel is only allowed using QR codes. According to activists of the Yellow Ribbon movement, these measures imposed by the occupation administration indicate serious and persistent problems with logistics and supplies to the peninsula.
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.