According to Russian media reports, a Russian tanker was attacked by Ukrainian drones in the Kerch Strait. The tanker in the straits off the Crimean peninsula was damaged in the attack, the Russian state news agency TASS reported on Saturday morning, citing the sea rescue service. Accordingly, two smugglers had arrived on site. No fuel had leaked from the tanker with eleven people on board, it said.
According to the “Moscow Times” it is the tanker “SIG”, against which the USA imposed sanctions because it supplied fuel to Russian forces in Syria.
Traffic on the strategically important bridge across the strait connecting Moscow-annexed Crimea to Russia was halted for about three hours, the Highway Information Center announced on its Telegram channel.
An explosion on the ship could be seen from the peninsula and local residents believed it to be an explosion near the Yakovenkovo settlement near the bridge, Vladimir Rogov, a representative of the Russian occupation authorities in southern Ukraine’s Zaporizhia region, wrote in the online service Telegram. Several crew members were injured by broken glass.
Only on Friday did Ukraine say it carried out a drone attack on a Russian naval ship at the Novorossiysk base in southern Russia. Russia said it repelled an attempted attack on the base by Ukrainian forces “with the help of two unmanned boats.”
Attacks from both sides in the region have escalated since Moscow last month pulled out of the grain deal that allowed Ukrainian grain exports through the Black Sea.
