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Smoke billows from explosions on Saki beach
Photo: Uncredited / dpa
Ammunition exploded at a Russian airbase on Russia's annexed Crimea peninsula in the Black Sea.
Videos circulated on social networks on Tuesday showing explosions and large clouds of smoke near bathing beaches.
They are said to have been taken in the village of Nowofyodorovka, not far from the seaside resort of Yevpatoria.
One person was killed, Crimean boss Sergei Aksjonov said, according to Russian agencies.
Seven other people, including two children, were injured, according to local sources.
Tourists fled the area.
Aksyonov said an area within a five-kilometer radius around the base had been cordoned off.
The fire was brought under control by evening.
He did not comment on the cause of the explosion.
Fire safety violations as a possible cause
According to the New York Times, the massive explosions were caused by a Ukrainian attack.
A weapon developed by Ukraine itself was used, the newspaper quoted a senior Ukrainian military officer as saying.
No further details were given.
The Russian Defense Ministry in Moscow announced that ammunition had exploded.
Fire safety violations are suspected to be the cause.
"It was an air base from which planes regularly took off to attack our forces on the southern front," the Ukrainian officer said, according to the New York Times.
Local partisans loyal to Ukraine also played a role in the attack.
"Today's explosions in Novofyodorovka are further evidence of who owns Crimea."
The Ukrainian Defense Ministry said it could not say what caused the explosions.
However, there is a risk that Russia will falsify evidence of an alleged Ukrainian attack.
August 9 is International Day of Indigenous Peoples, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk wrote on Telegram.
In Ukraine, these included the Crimean Tatars, the Karaims and the Crimean Chaks.
"Today's explosions in Novofyodorovka are further evidence of who owns Crimea."
The Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podoliak wrote on Twitter: "This is just the beginning." Crimea has a future as a travel paradise without Russian occupation.
Russia annexed Crimea in 2014.
In the course of the war of aggression that began at the end of February, Moscow repeatedly demanded that Crimea be recognized as Russian territory – which Kyiv clearly rejects.
Internationally, too, the peninsula with its more than two million inhabitants continues to be regarded as Ukrainian territory.
czl/dpa/AFP