British missiles help thwart Black Sea fleet

Moscow forced to change tactics as British weapons help Ukraine push Russian ships 60 miles off shore

Ukraine has pushed the Russian navy 60 miles back from the Black Sea coast with the help of anti-ship missiles supplied by Britain. Russian forces have turned to coastal missile systems to try to reassert control of the area. They also dispatched extra forces to Snake Island, 30 miles off the coast of Ukraine, to strengthen air defences. In an attempt to help Kyiv end the blockade of its ports, Britain promised to send hundreds of Brimstone anti-ship missiles to bolster defences.

UKRAINE has pushed the Russian naval fleet 60 miles (100km) back from the Black Sea coast with the help of antiship missiles supplied by Britain.

Moscow has battled for dominance in the area, where its ships are carrying out a naval blockade on food exports.

But now the Kremlin has been forced to change its tactics in an effort to maintain control over the main shipping routes out of Ukraine.

“As a result of our active actions aimed at defeating enemy naval forces, the group of ships of the Russian Black Sea Fleet was pushed back from the Ukrainian shores at a distance of more than one hundred kilometres,” Ukraine’s ministry of defence said on the Telegram messaging app.

Russian forces have turned to coastal missile systems to try and reassert their control of the area. They also dispatched additional forces to Russian-held Snake Island, the rocky outpost 30 miles off the coast of Ukraine, to strengthen air defences in the region.

The Institute for the Study of War, a Us-based think tank, said Ukraine’s navy was challenging for dominance of the waters.

“These reports suggest that Ukrainian naval pressure and anti-ship missiles – likely including those provided by the UK and other states – have forced the Russian grouping in the north-western Black Sea to rely more on coastal and air defence as they are pushed away from the Ukrainian shoreline,” it said.

“Ukraine will likely attempt to leverage these successes to alleviate the economic pressure of the Russian blockade on Ukraine’s ports and seek additional economic support from the west, including possibly opening up new routes for international aid to Ukraine.”

While Russia has maintained naval dominance, Kyiv has been able to effectively use anti-ship missiles to cripple some of Moscow’s main ships.

Ukrainian forces managed to sink the flagship of Russia’s Black Sea fleet, the Moskva, with a pair of Ukrainian Neptune missiles.

In an attempt to help Kyiv end the blockade of its ports, Britain promised to send hundreds of Brimstone antiship missiles to bolster naval defences.

Despite the assistance, a Ukrainian official warned: “The threat of Russian missiles strikes from the sea remains.”

The source added Russian ships continue to “block civil navigation in the area”, adding to concerns of a global food crisis while grains exports from Ukraine are blocked.

Sergei Shoigu, Russia’s defence minister, said yesterday that the Kremlin was using the captured Azov Sea ports of Mariupol and Berdynask to restart grain exports from Ukraine.

“The de-mining of Mariupol’s port has been completed. It is functioning normally, and has received its first cargo ships,” he said.

Kyiv has accused Russia of stealing grain supplies and using captured Ukrainian ports to export it to Africa and the Middle East.

Mr Shoigu also claimed that Russian forces had opened a “land corridor” across southern and eastern Ukraine, linking mainland Russia with Crimea.

He said 750 miles of railway tracks had been restored to move goods to Kremlin-controlled areas of Mariupol, Berdyansk and Kherson.

Yesterday Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, arrived in Turkey for talks on unblocking grain deliveries from Ukraine.

A row over the looming global food shortage prompted a Russian walkout of a meeting of the United Nations’ Security Council, after Charles Michel, the European Council’s president, accused Russia of using food supplies as a “stealth missile” by blocking ports and stealing grain from Ukraine.

Vassily Nebenzia, the Russian envoy, walked out of the meeting and later accused Mr Michel of spreading lies.

Meanwhile, the battle for Severodonetsk, the last Ukraine-held city in the Luhansk region, was said to be changing hourly as its defenders were holding out under merciless shelling. Capturing the city is seen as a key goal in Mr Putin’s objectives of seizing control of the eastern Donbas regions.

The news came as Ukraine accused Russia of detaining 600 people, mostly journalists and pro-kyiv figures, in detention camps in the Kremlin-held Kherson region.