Russian Ship Transports Stolen Ukrainian Goods At Least 5 Times Since Beginning Of Summer

The Russian general cargo ship, Alfa M, has made at least five illegal calls at ports in the occupied Crimea since the beginning of June this year to transport goods stolen by Russians from Ukrainian territories.

This is the result of an investigation conducted by the SeaKrime project, the CFTS portal reports, citing the Ukrainian Shipping Magazine (USM).

According to the investigation, the Alfa M flies the Russian flag. The vessel has called at the closed ports of Feodosia and Sevastopol since the beginning of the summer. The offending vessel transported cargo from the occupied Crimea to the Turkish port of Bartin, as well as to the port of Kavkaz in the Kerch Strait for transshipment.

The vessel loaded 6,500 tons of stolen metal on 10 June for its first voyage and sailed to the Turkish port of Bartin on 12 June. Previously, the Russians had exported only scrap metal from Kerch, Feodosia, and Sevastopol. Now, the Turkish port has received steel products, probably from the occupied Ukrainian territory.

According to the investigation, 9,500 tons of grain were loaded onto the ship on 26 June. The shipper of the cargo is the Russian company Kuban-Forward. The grain was delivered to the roadstead of the port of Kavkaz for transshipment.

Alfa M performed its next voyage to occupied Sevastopol on 5 July. At that time, 9,000 tons of barley were transferred onto it. The grain was delivered to the port of Kavkaz.

The Alfa M vessel was loaded in occupied Feodosia from 14 to 21 July, after which it illegally transported an additional 8,500 tons of grain to the port of Kavkaz. The vessel sailed back to occupied Sevastopol after delivering the stolen grain.

The vessel entered occupied Sevastopol to load grain on 30 July. On 4 August, the ship station on the Alfa M was switched on, and the AIS system showed that the vessel's location was Komysheva Bay in Sevastopol.

According to investigative journalists, the captain of the bulk carrier then tried to hide his crime of violating Ukraine’s state border: the AIS signal showed a few hours later that the ship had "teleported" to the Turkish port of Tuzla.

The Alfa M was supposedly near another Turkish port, Samsun, on the morning of 7 August. However, according to journalists with the SeaKrime project, the vessel remained in the Komysheva Bay in occupied Sevastopol, from where it departed with 9,500 tons of stolen wheat on board.