Moscow:
A cargo ship sank in international waters in the Mediterranean this week due to an “act of terrorism,” the Russian state-owned company that owns the ship said on Wednesday.
“We believe that a targeted terrorist attack was carried out in the constellation Ursa Major on December 23, 2024,” Oboron Logistica said in a statement quoted by Russian news agencies, but who was responsible for the act? , and did not clarify the reason.
The ship sank in international waters off the coast of Spain early Tuesday after sending a distress call for help on Monday.
The company, which is part of Russia's Ministry of Defense, added that “three consecutive explosions” occurred before the ship began landing in the water.
Oboron Logistica has not disclosed the evidence that led it to conclude that the sinking of the Ursa Major was a terrorist attack.
The Russian Foreign Ministry's crisis response department said on Telegram on Tuesday that the ship sank “due to an explosion in the engine room.”
Of the 16 Russian crew members on board the ship, 14 were rescued and taken to the Spanish port of Cartagena, it said, adding that two were missing.
The ship sent out a distress call in bad weather on Monday morning off the coast of southeastern Spain, reporting that the ship had listed and the crew had launched a lifeboat, Spain's maritime rescue service said in a statement.
Spain dispatched helicopters and rescue ships to transport survivors to port, the military said.
A Russian warship then arrived and took charge of the rescue operation as the ship was between Spanish and Algerian waters, but the Ursa Major sank overnight.
Ursa Major is listed on MarineTraffic.com as a general cargo vessel with a length of 124.7 meters (409 feet).
According to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the facility is owned by a subsidiary of Russia's Ovoron Logistica, which is part of the Ministry of Defense and also provides civilian transport and logistics.
Ursa Major was traveling from the Russian city of St. Petersburg to Vladivostok in Russia's far east.
Ovolon Logistica issued a press release last week with photos of the ship in port, transporting particularly large and heavy cargo to Vladivostok: a crane weighing 380 tons and an icebreaker hatch cover weighing 45 tons. He said it was for the sake of it.
In 2022, the United States imposed sanctions on Ovolon Logistica and its vessels, including the Ursa Major, for providing “transportation services for the delivery of cargo to Russian-occupied Crimea.”
This means any U.S. organization that does business with the company or its vessels risks sanctions.
Ukraine's GUR military intelligence agency said the Ursa Major was also used to supply Russian forces in Syria, where Moscow has a naval base in Tartus.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
