Ukraine seizes Russian tanker in Black Sea
Ukraine has detained a Russian tanker over its alleged role in a naval confrontation that led to Moscow's seizure of three Ukrainian vessels last November. In a statement on Thursday, Ukraine's SBU security service said the vessel, now called Nika Spirit and formerly named the Neyma, was identified and detained on Wednesday after it entered the Black Sea port of Izmail.
Vladimir Dzhabarov, a senior Russian legislator, described the tanker's seizure as "absolutely illegal" and said the move was detrimental to relations between the two neighbours, according to the RIA news agency.
The SBU said the tanker was used in the Russian operation to block Ukrainian vessels from sailing through the Kerch Strait, a waterway that links the Black Sea with the Sea of Azov on November 25 last year. During the incident, Russia's coastguard opened fire and seized the Ukrainian ships and detained their crews totalling 24 Ukrainians.
The confrontation sparked a major diplomatic crisis between the two countries. At the time, Ukraine-Russia ties were already in freefall because of Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and the subsequent outbreak of a pro-Russian separatist struggle in the eastern Donbass region.
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