The International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea ordered Russia to release three Ukrainian navy boats and 24 sailors arrested in the Black Sea while approaching the Kerch Strait six months ago, according to a ruling announced on May 25.
The Hamburg-based court ruled that Russia had violated the immunity granted to warships and naval vessels and their crew under the United Nations Convention of the Law of Sea when Russian special services attacked and seized three Ukrainian navy boats with 24 crew members on board on Nov. 25, 2018.
The ruling gives Ukraine’s version: “According to Ukraine, the three naval vessels had departed from the port of Odesa, in the Black Sea, and their mission was to transit, through the Kerch Strait, to the port of Berdyansk in the Sea of Azov.” As the vessels approached the entrance to the Kerch Strait оn the night of Nov. 24-25, “the vessels received radio communications from the Russian Coast Guard – а division of the Border Service of the Federal Security Service – asserting that the strait was closed.” The Ukrainian vessels were then blocked as they proceeded to the strait on Nov 25 by Russian Coast Guard vessels. “The Ukrainian vessels later turned around and navigated away from the Kerch Strait but were pursued by the Coast Guard vessels,” according to the ruling. “During the pursuit, one Coast Guard vessel fired at the Berdyansk, wounding three members of its crew and causing damage to the vessel.” All three Ukrainian vessels and the servicemen on board were seized and detained, while the three vessels were sent to the port of Kerch on Nov. 26.
Read more: Russia’s attack in the Black Sea, as it happened (EXPLAINER)
The crew — 22 naval officers and two officers of the Security Service of Ukraine — have been held in a detention center in Moscow. Their detention has recently been extended until July. Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights declared them prisoners of war.
Ukrainian authorities claimed that they had unsuccessfully tried to secure their release with Russia through diplomatic means and sued Russia for violating the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea to the UN tribunal.
Russia did not participate in the hearing “in the case initiated by Ukraine” but judges decided that the absent party was still a party in the proceeding.
“We expect Russia to fulfill the tribunal’s order quickly and entirely. I remind that in a similar case of Arctic Sunsire, Russia didn’t participate in the hearing but promptly released the people,” Ukraine’ deputy foreign minister, Olena Zerkal, wrote on her Facebook.
Manuel Sarrazin, member of the German parliament who followed the case and attended the hearing today, said that while the UN tribunal can’t force Kremlin to follow the order, it is an important political measure.
“If Russia doesn’t release the Ukrainian sailors it means it ignores the international law and shows that it has no credibility in a peaceful resolution,” he told the Kyiv Post.
The Russian authorities have accused the Ukrainian crew of three navy boats of trespassing its territorial waters, a 12-mile strip off the coast of Crimea, a Ukrainian peninsula invaded and annexed by Russia in 2014.
Ukrainian authorities condemned the attack as Russia’ attempt to seize full control over the Kerch Strait and the Azov Sea despite the 2003 treaty between the two countries on the shared use.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy repeatedly declared that return of Ukrainian prisoners of war, including the detained sailors, is his priority.
