Two Russian naval ships are operating 30 miles off the British coast, escorting sanctioned tankers through the Channel and risking both environmental disaster and armed conflict with Moscow.
A Kremlin supply ship is helping keep a Russian warship, armed with cruise and surface-to-air missiles, at sea – allowing it to escort dozens of sanctioned tankers accused of facilitating Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine.
The vessels have worked in tandem and have visited British shores three times in the past two months, finding refuge near critical UK infrastructure under the full view of the British Royal Navy.
A hulking 122-metre floating workshop that serves Putin’s Baltic fleet, has been supplying a Russian armed warship, the RFN Admiral Grigorovich, with supplies and fuel while it loiters around the Galloper wind farm, located off the Suffolk coastline, which powers 400,000 UK homes.
The manoeuvres, which see the ships occasionally enter UK waters, have allowed the Admiral Grigorovich to accompany over a dozen so-called “shadow fleet” tankers through the English Channel, according to data by Starboard Maritime Intelligence.
