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Why Russia's return of Ukrainian ships mattered
Summary
A look back at the handover of three seized Ukrainian Navy vessels, a year after the Kerch Strait confrontation.
What did it mean when Russia handed back three Ukrainian Navy vessels on 18 November 2019? The return closed one chapter of a dispute that began with an incident in the Kerch Strait the previous year.
The vessels were seized on 25 November 2018. Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) coast guard fired upon and captured three Ukrainian Navy vessels as they tried to pass from the Black Sea into the Sea of Azov on their way to the port of Mariupol. It was the first time Russian forces had openly engaged Ukrainian forces during the Russo-Ukrainian War.
A year later
The handover on 18 November 2019 came almost a year after the seizure. It was reported at the time as part of the wider Russia–Ukraine crisis, and it returned to Ukraine the three ships that had been held since the confrontation.
What the return did and did not settle
The return concerned the vessels themselves. It did not alter the fact that the 2018 clash had marked the first open engagement between the two countries' forces in the war, and the episode remained part of the broader relationship between Kyiv and Moscow.
