Vladimir Putin is losing his grip on the gateway to the Black Sea after Ukraine launched a series of devastating attacks on Russian ships in the critical waterway that heralds an extraordinary reversal of fortunes.
Kyiv has been using drones to target Russian tankers sailing across the Sea of Azov, a key inland sea off the south of Ukraine that connects to the Black Sea, Eastern Europe and the rest of the world.
Ukraine’s armed forces have posted dramatic videos showing aerial and sea drones hurtling into Moscow’s “shadow fleet” vessels in the waterway.
Russia has been forced to suspend shipping through the Don-Azov canal, which connects the Caspian Sea to the Azov and Black Sea via the river network, Reuters reported. Ukraine claims Russia can no longer use the Kerch Strait that separates occupied Crimea from Russia.
The scenes pushed Sergei Lavrov, Putin’s veteran foreign minister, into a rage-filled rant this week in which he branded the attacks “acts of terrorism” that went “beyond even piracy”, while admitting that they were “inflicting damage and spreading fear”.
