Anti-tank obstacles put up on the Black Sea beach near Karolino-Buhaz, Bilhorod-Dnistrovsky district, Odesa region, were removed after causing anxiety among the local population.
The Southern Regional Department of the State Border Guard Service
told Interfax that it had nothing to do either with the installation or
with the removal of the obstacles, which were shaped as World War I-era
Czech hedgehogs and were taken away a day after they were put up.
There have been photos of the obstacles on the Internet.
The media center of the Armed Forces Operational Command South told
Interfax that military personnel had been used to install and remove the
obstacles. However, the center did not elaborate, citing secrecy
considerations.
One military source told Interfax that defense was not the purpose of the obstacles.
“Otherwise there would have had to be a solid row of hedgehogs
fortified with an obstacle that was hard to notice and with barbed wire
instead of placing them at a distance of 30 meters between each other.
As far as I know, those hedgehogs were the initiative of the local
authorities. It’s hard to say what the purpose of it was. Now the
[obstacles] have been brought together and will be used in other places,
somewhere where they would be more effective,” the source said.
