A sanctioned Russian ship with a mystery cargo has sunk in the Mediterranean after an on board explosion.
Fourteen crew members were reported to have been rescued, while two are still said to be missing.
Ukrainian military intelligence and Spanish sources suggested the Ursa Major was heading to Syria to transport Russian military equipment which is being pulled from the country following the fall of dictator Bashar al-Assad.
Russian sources claim that it was heading to Vladivostok, carrying huge cranes weighing 380 tons each, intended for the construction of a modern nuclear icebreaker, described as a key ‘state task’.
‘To ensure the stability of the vessel when performing cargo operations with oversized cargo, containers were loaded onto the lower deck in advance as additional ballast [in a] complex cargo handling operation,’ an official statement read.
Both versions may be true – and it may have been due to call at Tartus in Syria, a Russian naval base under the Assad regime, to collect cargo bound for naval port Vladivostok.
The 466ft Ursa Major sank in international waters between Spain and Algeria on Monday, just after midday.
