Satellite recorded the movement of cargo ships in Mariupol: Russians can export metal and grain/Radio Liberty
Occupants have intensified their activities in the captured port of Mariupol. According to satellite images released by Schema journalists, the invaders can send metal and grain from there.
Planet Labs photos showed that in the port of Mariupol captured by the invaders, foreign ships moved to the berths where they usually ship products .
What is known about the situation in the Mariupol port
The journalists found out that the grain stored in the grain terminal of the port belongs to Ukraine, and most of the metal belongs to Rinat Akhmetov's Metinvest company. Earlier, Igor Barsky, director of the Mariupol Commercial Sea Port, announced the intention of the infidels to take out Ukrainian property.
According to information from the administration of the Mariupol port, since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, 6 cargo ships under foreign flags have been in the port waters .
Schema journalists found that 2 of them are Lady Augusta (Jamaica, North America) and Tzarevna (Malta). On May 24, the Planet Labs satellite captured them at the piers. In particular, where the grain terminal is located.
Previously, Tzarevna stood at other berths of the port, where metal products were mainly loaded. This is evidenced by a satellite image on May 11. Lady Augusta was moored nearby.
Now three other vessels have moved to the metal loading berths. These are Blue Star-1 (Panama, Central America), Azburg (Dominica) and Azov Concord (Malta).
Previously, they stood at the berths next to one of the exits to the Sea of Azov, which is called “New Gate” . This is evidenced by a photo of Planet Labs from May 11th. At the same time, the satellite recorded another ship next to them – Smarta (Liberia).
What ships are in the captured port of Mariupol:
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for the occupation. The occupiers seized the crew members and took them away in an unknown direction. After that, Smarta did not change its location.
Help.Approximately 200,000 tons of metal and cast iron worth more than $170 million remain on the territory of the Mariupol Trade Port enterprise. Most of the metal belongs to Metinvest, Rinat Akhmetov. Other metal and cast iron are products of Azovstal and the Ilyich Iron and Steel Works.
Metinvest reported that part of the metal products had already been loaded onto the Tzarevna vessel, which remained in the port. Before the start of a full-scale invasion, these products were being prepared for export to Italy.
There was not only metal, but also grain on the port territory
Port Director Igor Barsky said that there was not only metal, but warehouses with grain. In total, more than 3.4 thousand tons of grain remained in the warehouses. Another 9 thousand tons were loaded onto one of the ships, but it could not leave the port due to the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Advisor to the Mayor of Mariupol Petr Andryushchenko said that the infidels are trying to resume the work of the port and raised the sunken boat of border guards, blocking one of the exits to the Sea of Azov – the so-called “old gate”.
Infidels reopening the port, and plan to take everything they can out of there. But access to the sea through the “old gates” may not be suitable for them, because the depth is too small for most of the boards that are located there, and the “new gates” remain, according to our information, blocked, Vadim Boychenko said.
< p>“New Gates” blocks another sunken ship “Meotida”, which the invaders have not yet managed to raise. Also, the loading of ships is now complicated by the fact that the cranes necessary for this do not work due to a lack of electricity as a result of damage to the port substation.
At the same time, the infidels plan to use a floating crane, which can also load metal into the holds of ships.
There was a diesel floating crane that they can use to load. It is unlikely that they will be able to restore the work of the substation in the near future, – said the director of the port, Igor Barsky.
Note that the crew of Tzarevna was blocked by the invaders for a long time. The Bulgarian government and Malta have been negotiating to provide a green corridor for evacuation. Then it became known that part of the crew was taken to temporarily occupied Donetsk.
Schema journalists contacted the owner of Tzarevna, Bulgarian citizen Daniel Stefanov, but he did not want to comment to journalists.
Blocking of Ukrainian ports by Russia: latest news
- The aggressor country is blocking Ukrainian ports, effectively blocking most of the country's exports. In particular, on February 24, not a single cargo ship could leave Odessa. The lack of supply of certain products provided by Ukraine, primarily grain, will lead to a further increase in prices around the world.
- According to estimates, more than 400 million people in the world depend on the supply of grain from Ukraine. Concern about the rising level of hunger in the world was expressed even in the UN. Many countries require Russia to unblock Ukrainian ports.
- Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko said that the aggressor state can provide humanitarian corridors for ships to leave Ukrainian ports in the Black Sea, but has a number of requirements . In particular, the infidels want sanctions restrictions to be eased against them and for the Ukrainian side to clear the port water area on its own.
