Sunday, Mar 2nd 2025

By TOM MIDLANE

Published: 05:57 EST, 2 March 2025 

Vladimir Putin unleashed a missile strike to ‘sink’ a cargo ship amid unconfirmed Russian claims it was carrying British weapons for use by Ukraine.

Two Iskander-M ballistic missiles hit the Panama-flagged container ship MSC LEVANTE F – reportedly Swiss-owned – soon after it arrived in Odesa on March 1, after making a stop in Turkey.

Two port workers were believed to have been wounded in the strike, which also damaged infrastructure, Ukrainian reports said. 

The report of the attack comes as British prime minister Sir Keir Starmer today hosts Volodymyr Zelensky and other European leaders to discuss the future of the war torn nation following the Ukrainian president’s televised spat with US president Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance. 

Russian Telegram channel TalipoV [sic] Online Z claimed that the vessel was loaded with drones and weaponry that had been collected from a NATO base in Turkey before being transported to Odesa in Ukraine. 

However, the channel is run by pro-Putin, Crimea-based blogger Oleksandr Talipov, who was charged with ‘nation-based enmity against Ukrainian citizens’ and hate speech by Ukrainian prosecutors in 2022. 

Tapipov said: ‘It was established that in Turkey the ship loaded additional containers of two colours on board – red and yellow – which contained British sea drones and weapons from the Turkish NATO base.

‘Upon arrival at the port of Odesa, the ship was hit by two missiles at berth number two at 18:00.

The container ship MSC LEVANTE F carrying yellow and red shipping containers that a Russian Telegram channel claimed contained ‘British sea drones and weapons from the Turkish NATO base’ – a claim directly challenged by the Ukrainian vice prime minister Oleksii Kuleba who said that the vessel was carrying ‘completely civilian cargo’

People run in fear after a loud explosion was heard by the sea port in Odesa on March 1 – believed to by the Russian strike on the container ship MSC LEVANTE F

Russian Iskander-M mobile short-range ballistic missiles (pictured here at the Army 2019 International Military Technical Forum in Patriot Park in Alabino, Moscow region) of the type reportedly used to sink the container ship MSC LEVANTE F