The Royal Navy are carefully tracking the movements of Russian warships currently anchored in the English Channel to carry out military exercises.
Russia’s Western Military District’s press service confirmed that a squadron of ships from the Russian Navy’s Northern Fleet passed through the Strait of Dover earlier today. The ships, which include a naval destroyer, a landing craft, a rescue tugboat and a tank ship, are now anchored in neutral waters in the Seine Bay, waiting for a storm to pass, before continuing with their drills.
The French Navy confirmed the location of the Russian ships and said it was not unusual for Russia to have ships in the area.
The ships presence in British waters comes amid heightened tensions between Russia and the European Union, with Western leaders accusing Russia of backing separatists rebels in Eastern Ukraine in a conflict which has cost nearly a thousand lives since the supposed peace deal on 5 September.
In October, Russia was accused of sending a ‘midget sub’ into the waters around Stockholm, Sweden, after the Swedish Navy detected the presence of a “mystery foreign submarine“.
