Russian President Vladimir Putin with Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov. File
| Photo Credit: AP

Russia’s Defence Minister ordered officials to prepare a “response” to U.S. drone flights over the Black Sea, the Ministry said on Friday, in an apparent warning that Moscow may take forceful action to ward off the American reconnaissance aircraft.

The Russian Defence Ministry noted a recent “increased intensity” of U.S. drones over the Black Sea, saying they “conduct intelligence and targeting for precision weapons supplied to the Ukrainian military by Western countries for strikes on Russian facilities”.

“It shows an increased involvement of the U.S. and other NATO countries in the conflict in Ukraine on the side of the Kyiv regime,” the Ministry said in a statement.

It noted that “such flights significantly increase the probability of incidents involving Russian military aircraft, which increases the risk of direct confrontation between the alliance and the Russian Federation”.

“NATO members will bear responsibility for that,” it added.

The Ministry said that Defence Minister Andrei Belousov has directed the General Staff to “make proposals on measures of operative response to provocations”.

Washington and Moscow have clashed before over U.S. drones in the Black Sea. In a 2023 incident, a Russian fighter jet damaged an American drone there, causing it to crash.

A repeat of such a confrontation could further fuel tensions over the war in Ukraine.

On March 14, 2023, a Su-27 fighter jet of the Russian air force intercepted and damaged a U.S. MQ-9 Reaper drone, causing it to crash into the Black Sea. The incident marked the first direct clash between the Russian and U.S. forces since the Cold War.

The Pentagon and U.S. European Command said after the incident that two Russian Su-27 aircraft dumped fuel on the MQ-9, which was conducting a routine surveillance mission over the Black Sea in international airspace.

The Russian Defence Ministry said then that the U.S. drone was flying near the Russian border and intruded into an area that was declared off-limits by Russian authorities.

A mansion on the Black Sea coast, often linked to Russian president Vladimir Putin, has been refashioned to include a church equipped with a throne, according to a report by Russian investigative outlet Proekt. It published the videos of “Putin’s palace”, which were recently renovated. The existence of the mansion was first revealed in 2021 by Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who had said that it has a wine cellar, a casino and an ice rink. Russia has not official reacted to the Proekt report.

The palace is sealed off from rest of the Russia by 17,000 acres of forest and a special no-fly zone.

“Many viewers of Navalny’s video remembered the entertainment areas – with a pole, a casino, as well as a room with toy cars and a railway,” Proekt said in its report, adding that none of these areas exist anymore.

It also said that renovations suggest Putin “seems to be obsessed with war and religion”.

The photos show a home church featuring a triptych and a wooden throne. The walls of the room are decorated with crosses, and the triptych appears to depict a “Saint Prince Vladimir”, two art historians and one icon painter said, Proekt further said.

The outlet made a particular mention of a chandelier, which it said has been made using red crystals from the French manufacturer Baccarat and costs $1 million.

In his 2021 video, Mr Navalny had claimed that the property costs $1.3 billion and alleged it was paid for via an elaborate corruption scheme in which Putin gave top jobs and lucrative government projects to his allies at partially state-owned energy giants.

Thousands of Russians had come out on the streets in 2021 when Mr Navalny published the expose on Mr Putin’s Black Sea complex.

But Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov had dismissed the claims in the report at the time, calling it “pure nonsense”.

London:

 Russia may use sea mines to target civilian shipping in the Black Sea, including by laying them on the approach to Ukrainian ports, the British government said on Wednesday citing intelligence.

Russia pulled out of a deal in July that had allowed Ukraine to safely ship food products out through what is traditionally its main export corridor.

Ukraine responded by setting up a temporary “humanitarian corridor” for cargo vessels, and several ships have left Ukraine’s Black Sea ports since.

Britain said its assessment of the intelligence was that Russia was seeking to target civilian shipping travelling through the humanitarian corridor in order to deter the export of Ukrainian grain.

“Russia almost certainly wants to avoid openly sinking civilian ships, instead falsely laying blame on Ukraine for any attacks against civilian vessels in the Black Sea,” Britain’s Foreign Office said in a statement.

“By releasing our assessment of this intelligence, the UK seeks to expose Russia’s tactics to deter any such incident from occurring.”

Last month Britain accused Russia of targeting a civilian cargo ship at port in the Black Sea on Aug. 24 in a missile attack it said was successfully thwarted by Ukrainian defences.

Britain said it was working with Ukraine and other partners to put in place arrangements to improve the safety of shipping, and was using its intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities to monitor Russian activity in the Black Sea.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Moscow:

Russia said on Wednesday its forces had destroyed four Ukrainian boats carrying up to 50 troops in the Black Sea.

An aircraft “destroyed four high-speed military boats with landing groups of Ukrainian special operations forces with a total number of up to 50 people” in the Black Sea around midnight Moscow time (2100 GMT) Russia’s defence ministry said in a statement on Telegram.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)