In Kyiv they complain that they continue to deal with the consequences of the seizure of “Nord” in “manual mode”
After the incident near the Kerch Strait, when three Ukrainian military ships tried to break through, violating the Russian border, the Russian Federation only increased pressure on Ukrainian sea ports in Azov and increased the delay time of ships going to Berdyansk and Mariupol.
Ukrainian expert Andrey Klimenko, who monitors maritime activity, stated this in his blog, as reported by a PolitNavigator correspondent.
According to the expert, some merchant ships are waiting for permission to enter Ukrainian ports within nine days.
“The blockade of Ukrainian ports has not stopped. Quite the opposite. It continues in “manual mode” and sets “new records.” Since the evening of December 1, 8 ships have been allowed to leave the Kerch Strait for Mariupol, waiting for permission from 161 to 223 hours. Even taking into account the loss of time due to the storm (about 48 hours), the waiting time is unprecedented, of these 8 ships, 5 are related to EU countries... As a result of this approach, two Ukrainian ports have lost more than double their cargo traffic, forced to switch to a 4-day working week and lay off workers,” writes Klimenko.
At the same time, he assures that ships heading to Russian ports on the Sea of Azov pass through the strait without any problems.
Let us recall that the tightening of inspections of ships traveling to Ukrainian ports began after the seizure of the Russian fishing vessel “Nord” by Ukrainian border guards.
As a reminder, last Sunday, two small armored artillery boats, the Berdyansk and Nikopol, and the tugboat Yany Kapu attempted to transit the Kerch Strait, which is closed to Russia. After repeated warnings from Russian border guards about violating the Russian border, the tugboat was rammed by the Russian patrol ship Don.
Subsequently, the Ukrainian vessels and crew, which had violated the Russian state border, were captured by Russian special forces.
In response to this, Ukraine convened the Security Council and the Verkhovna Rada and introduced martial law in some regions bordering the Russian Federation.
In Kyiv , they complain that they continue to manually deal with the consequences of the Nord seizure.