The State Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and the Military Prosecutor’s office says they have detained the Russian tanker Nika Spirit after it entered the Ukrainian Danube River port of Izmail on July 24.
The ship’s entire crew of 15, however, has been released, according to the SBU, the ship’s owner and later confirmed by Russian diplomats. It is not clear why the Russian-flagged vessel sailed up the Danube and into the Ukrainian port.
Nika Spirit was previously called the Neyma and played a pivotal role in a major incident close to the Kerch Strait on November 25 last year.
An SBU statement on July 25 alleged that the tanker was the same vessel used to obstruct access to the Kerch Strait, which connects the Black Sea and the Azov Sea. Three Ukrainian naval vessels attempting to traverse the strait and reach a port on Ukraine’s coast were blocked from doing so, before being pursued by Russian coast guard ships into international waters. The Ukrainian vessels were fired upon by Russian ships, supported from the air, and all 24 Ukrainian crew members and their ships were seized by Russian special forces.
Up until today, the Ukrainian sailors have been held in Moscow prisons on charges of allegedly violating the Russian maritime border that the Kremlin enforces around the waters of illegally occupied Crimea. The Ukrainian vessels are still impounded at the Russian port of Kerch on the occupied Crimean peninsula.
According to the SBU, the Nika Spirit tanker was flying the Russian flag as it arrived at the Danube River port of Izmail on July 24. The vessel bears the International Maritime Organization identification number 8895528, which, according to information provided in the Euquasis database, identifies it as the same Neyma tanker involved in the Nov. 25 incident.
“The investigation found out that the Russian owner changed the Neyma tanker’s name into Nika Spirit in order to conceal its role in the illegal activities and the act of aggression,” the SBU said.
“As of now, the group of SBU detectives, military prosecutors, and border guards have completed their probe sanctioned by a Ukrainian court – the search aimed to establish the factual circumstances of the case, expropriating the vessel’s paperwork, radio communication recorded during the conflict, the ship log. The crew has been interrogated, all documents required for ascertaining the truth as part of the investigation have been expropriated.”
“The mentioned vessel have been acknowledged as material evidence, and a court request on its arrest is being prepared,” the SBU further stated.
The SBU also released a video from the scene.
Anatoliy Matios, the Chief Military Prosecutor of Ukraine, published on his Facebook page a number of pictures allegedly taken at the scene showing at least 7 Russian passports belonging to the Nika Spirit crew.
Olena Hitlyanska, an SBU spokeswoman, said on her Facebook page that the security service had published information not harmful to the investigation, and promised to reveal further details later.
Later in the day, the Russian authorities reacted to the incident by stating that “the circumstances are being ascertained in order to take adequate measures.”
“If the issue involves taking Russians hostages, this will be qualified as the most brutal violation of international law, and consequences will not be long in coming,” the Russian foreign ministry told the TASS news agency, before news of the sailors’ release had been confirmed.
The incident may become a factor in the hard-negotiated return of Ukrainian sailors from Russian captivity, which, according to Ukrainian officials, was stepping into the final stage just prior to the Neyma arrest.
As recently as on July 24, the Verkhovna Rada ombudswoman Liudmyla Denysova asserted that “an agreement to bring the sailors home has almost been reached.”
However, the Russian ombudswoman Tatiana Moskalkova, as well as the sailors’ defender Nikolay Polozov, did not confirm any certain agreements on the sailors. Denysova later made herself more specific by adding that negotiations were still ongoing.
This video grab taken from footage of local media Kerch Info on Nov. 25, 2018 shows Russian aircraft flying over the Crimean Bridge that spans the Kerch Strait, a narrow strip that links the Azov and Black seas, as a Russian ship blocks the strait, after Russia fired on and then seized three Ukrainian ships on Nov. 25, accusing them of illegally entering its waters in the Sea of Azov. (AFP)
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and his administration have not yet released any statements regarding the incident.
“Russia has been acting with impunity for the last 5 years with little or no reaction from our side except sharp but empty words,” said Glen Grant, a security and defense expert at the Kyiv-based think tank Ukrainian Institute. “There had to be some push back at some stage or more moves on Odesa would be next,” he added.
“The SBU has arrested the boat but released the crew. It will be interesting if Russia follows suit with the Ukrainian ship they just impounded in Russia and lets that crew go free. If Russia escalates this then it was coming anyway. They have been too quiet over the election period.”
