The United Kingdom very rarely reveals details about the movements of its top-secret fleet of nuclear submarines.
A Royal Navy attack submarine has surfaced near a Russian spy ship off the coast of Great Britain. This was a warning against espionage, which, according to the British Ministry of Defence, the vessel is engaged in.
This was announced by the British Defence Secretary John Gili, speaking to MPs in Parliament, Sky News reports.
He added that the incident with the nuclear submarine HMS Astute happened in November, but the Russian research vessel, called Yantar, returned to British waters this week.
John Gealy said he had allowed British warships and submarines to get closer to the vessel and better track its activities.
“We see you. We know what you’re doing. And we will not shrink from taking decisive action to protect this country,” the British minister said, addressing his words to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The United Kingdom very rarely reveals details about the movements of its top-secret fleet of nuclear submarines.
The decision to tell parliament that one of the submarines had surfaced close to the surveillance vessel underlines the extreme seriousness with which the UK takes the activities of the Russian vessel, which the MoD says was used to gather intelligence and map critical underwater infrastructure.
The Defence Secretary said the Yantar entered the UK’s “exclusive economic zone” on Monday, about 45 miles (72.4 km) from the British coast”.
He added that over the past two days the Royal Navy had deployed the Type 23 frigate HMS Somerset and the patrol ship HMS Tyne to “monitor the vessel minute-by-minute in our waters.”
Russia said the Yantar was an oceanographic research ship operated by its Ministry of Defence.
Recall that earlier the Russian ship Yantar entered Irish territorial waters and monitored an area with power lines and underwater internet cables. The vessel was seen operating spy drones.
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