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Ukraine has seized a foreign cargo ship near Odesa and arrested its captain, alleging the vessel illegally exported Ukrainian grain via the annexed Crimean peninsula. Ukrainian prosecutors and the security service (SBU) said the Azerbaijani captain was accused of violating rules on entering occupied territory and had allegedly repeatedly docked at the Crimean sea port of Sevastopol to pick up agricultural products in 2023-24.
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Prosecutors said that on one of its voyages in November 2023, the Cameroonian-flagged Usko Mfu loaded over 3,000 metric tons of agricultural products in Sevastopol intended for a Turkish company. Igor Delanoe, deputy director of the Franco-Russian Observatory, said this was the first time Ukraine had seized an internationally-flagged vessel over such alleged shipments.
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An official with the vessel’s Turkey-based ship manager Iyem Asya told Reuters the vessel’s current cargo was loaded in Moldova. “The ship, while under our ownership, did not take any cargoes from Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine and never used Ukrainian ports,” the official said. “Ukrainian soldiers boarded the ship while it was sailing along the Danube with a Romanian pilot present. They forcibly anchored it on their side of the river. Our lawyers are now pursuing the case.
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