HMS Defender Commander Says Russian Coast Guard Fired On British Destroyer

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 24th June, 2021) Russian coast guard boats fired on the HMS Defender as it passed close to the southernmost tip of Sevastopol in Russia's Crimea, the commander of the British ship said in an article published Thursday.

"That is the closest I have come to a Russian vessel in my 21-year career. I suspect the gunfire was from one of the coastguard vehicles," Commander Vincent Owen told the Daily Mail.

The UK Ministry of Defense denied the destroyer had been fired on and claimed it had been in Ukrainian waters. Russia accused it of trespassing and summoned the British defense attaché to the Foreign Ministry.

Owen told the daily that the command was confident of its right to what he described as innocent passage through international waters on a recognized Black Sea shipping route.

"I was comfortable we were out of range of its guns as we were travelling at 30 knots to their 21," he told the paper, adding that many Russian jets and an unmanned aerial vehicle interacted with his ship.

The Russian Defense Ministry said Defender, which was traveling from Ukraine, had sailed almost 2 miles into Russian waters. It said a gunboat fired warning shots at the warship, while a Su-24M jet dropped four bombs in its path.