Vladimir Putinhas suffered a humilating blow after Ukraine struck his £120million warship in ahuge attack near St Petersburg. The corvette Boykiy was hit in Kronstadt - headquarters of the Kremlin’s Baltic Fleet. The vessel was seen engulfed in flames in a Ukrainian video.
The 343ft-long vessel was like a “sitting duck” despite promises that defences had been tightened this week due to the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum [SPIEF], hosted by theRussiandictator. One year ago, the Boykiy was guarding Putin’s sanctions-busting shadow fleet through the English Channel.
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The Steregushchy-class corvette was hit while in dry dock in naval base Kronstadt some 700 miles from the nearest Ukrainian territory.
It is a Project 20380 corvette, in service with the Russian Baltic Fleet since 2013 and equipped with guided missile weapons.
The Ukrainians also staged a major assault on the St Petersburg Oil Terminal, one ofRussia’s most important Baltic Sea fuel-export hubs, handling millions of tonnes of petroleum products each year through rail-fed storage tanks and sea-tanker berths in the city’s main port. Putin is due to address the economic forum with a keynote speech on supposed “stability” in Russia despite the war.
Yet his second city - where Putin was born when it was known as Leningrad - was shrouded in noxious black smoke from the Ukrainian strikes.
Source: Daily Express :: World Feed
