A Ukrainian special operations trooper who was captured in a botched infiltration attempt has provided intelligence on British involvement in Kiev’s commando activity, Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) claimed on Thursday.
The Ukrainian combatant was identified in the statement as Evgeny Gorin, age 38. He and his fellow commandos from the 73rd Naval Special Purpose Center of the Ukrainian Special Operations Forces were intercepted by Russian troops when they tried to land at the Tendra Spit, a long sandbar in the Black Sea in Kherson Region.
Gorin confirmed during interrogation that he had received training in sabotage at Bulford Camp, England. He also confirmed that British military advisers had developed operational plans for an attack on a gas rig in the Black Sea.
The statement did not specify when the Ukrainian operation took place, but named the rig, which has been under Russian control since 2014. Officials in Kiev claimed in 2018 that the Russian military had deployed a radar station to the offshore facility. The FSB stressed that the Ukrainian assault on the site failed to yield “the equipment that the British were interested in” and that the Ukrainians used explosives to blow up the rig’s communications post.
The FSB stated that the Ukrainian unit is patronized by the Special Boat Service (SBS), the special operations unit of the British Royal Navy. Gorin’s testimony is an eyewitness account “of direct SBS involvement in developing actions directed against Russian security and training perpetrators of those actions on British soil,” the agency stressed.
The Ukrainian commando team was intercepted in a counteroperation conducted jointly with the Defense Ministry, according to the statement. The agency had learned about the Ukrainian plans in advance, it claimed.