Russia warship fires warning shot at British couple – The Latest
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What incident occurred involving a Russian warship and a British yacht?
This is The Guardian.
This is a kind of accident or an incident waiting to happen. Retired couple, I think on a day out, shots were fired. And at that point, they suddenly realised that they'd had a major problem. Russia's really stepped up its presence over the last few months. They have their transponders off.
What claims did Russia make about the British yacht's course?
And if you get too close, you know, they won't play nicely. It's certainly reckless behaviour. Warning shots should be a sort of, you know, your last option. But it comes at this time of kind of heightened tension between Britain and Russia.
From The Guardian's Today In Focus, this is The Latest with me, Nosheen Iqbal. Dan Sabah, you're The Guardian's defence and security editor.
How did the retired couple respond to the warning shots?
On Tuesday, we saw quite an interesting incident at sea. A Russian warship firing warning shots within... A few hundred meters of a British yacht with quite an unlikely presence on board, a retired couple who are out on the holidays, I think. Now, the Russians claim the yacht was on a dangerous course towards their ship and that they made several attempts to contact it. The couple say that this didn't happen. What on earth is going on?
Well, it's an extraordinary story, isn't it?
Why is the presence of Russian warships in the Channel significant?
You know, you've got a, you know, as you say, it's a retired couple. I think on a day out, they were taking their yacht from Limington on the south coast down to down to Cherbourg. And what I don't think they expected to find it because Russian warships don't turn their transponders there, you know, effectively there. If you like their ship radar on. It's a little bit unclear precisely what happened. There's a little bit of claim and counterclaim, but it does look like there was some kind of they sailed very close to this Russian warship. Too close as far as the Russians concerned. I don't think the Russians like it. These warships don't like it when the captors don't like it when you get within about 500 meters of these boats.
And it looks like there were some kind of warnings, perhaps a tannoy. Some of the Russians say there were flares. I don't think the retired couple say this or any flares being fired. But anyway, what was clear, because you can't mistake this sort of thing, was shots were fired from by sailors on the boat. You know, small arms, not the ship's big gun, I think, as far as we can tell. And at that point, they suddenly realized that they'd had a major problem and they sort of skedaddle, changed course.
What are the implications of heightened tensions between Britain and Russia?
And actually, if you look on the sort of radar tracks afterwards, their yacht is called the Bright Future, sort of sails in this rather crazy S-bend between Limington and Sherbrooke, where this Russian warship was somewhere in between.
I mean, it won't surprise you that I'm not a naval expert, but even to me, it sounds quite unlikely or unusual that that warship was there in the first place. Because it is, I mean, it's massive, right? It's about 125 metres long. It's got a helipad on there. It's got a big naval gun. I mean, what was it doing there?
And 10 times longer than the yacht, I think, which is about 12 metres long. So, yeah, it's a big hulking, brooding presence. I mean, this is not British territorial waters. These are international waters. It's not unusual for there to be warships from foreign countries, from Russia, in and around the UK. Having said that... Russia's really stepped up its presence over the last few months. And in particular, this particular frigate, the Admiral Grigorovich. And why is that? Because it's mostly been escorting the sort of Russian shadow fleet or Russian oil tankers from either the high north or from the Baltic through carrying laden with crude oil, escorting them through on their way to India or to China.
You know, quick look on the map and you'll see that's the only You know, these are the only viable routes. So this Russian warship has been a presence just off the coast of Britain, in the North Sea, in the Channel. It's been monitored by the British and the French for several months.
Okay. They've known about it and it's kind of almost expected for it to be there.
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
What incident occurred involving a Russian warship and a British yacht?
0:00–0:24
2
What claims did Russia make about the British yacht's course?
0:24–0:45
3
How did the retired couple respond to the warning shots?
0:45–1:16
4
Why is the presence of Russian warships in the Channel significant?
1:16–2:15
5
What are the implications of heightened tensions between Britain and Russia?
2:15–10:44