‘This is the first such incident against commercial shipping’. In the Ukrainian Port city of Mariupol, Russian-backed separatists have seized two foreign flagged ships. That’s according to Dryad Global’s latest Maritime Security Threat Advisory (MSTA), which highlighted that these were the Panama flagged Blue Star I and the Liberia-flagged Smarta vessel. The Blue Star I is a general cargo ship built in 2005, while the Smarta is a bulk carrier built in 2007, according to Marinetraffic.com. “The self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic’s Foreign Ministry informed the shipping companies that their vessels were subject to ‘forcible appropriation of movable property with forced conversion into state property’ without compensation to owners,” Dryad’s latest MSTA noted. “This is the first such incident against commercial shipping,” the MSTA added. Looking elsewhere in Ukraine, the MSTA stated that, in the Odessa region on July 7, a Russian missile hit a Moldovan tanker carrying diesel that […]