LONDON, Jan 23 (Reuters) – Britain’s Royal Navy shadowed Russian vessels sailing through the English Channel in a two-day operation coordinated with NATO allies, the navy said on Friday, as the military alliance steps up monitoring of Russian shipping.
The navy said two patrol ships, supported by a Wildcat helicopter, were dispatched to intercept the Russian warship Boikiy and accompanying oil tanker MT General Skobelev as they headed north, before handing the monitoring over to a NATO ally.
The operation comes a day after Britain said it provided support to a French operation to board a sanctioned Russian oil tanker as it passed through the Straits of Gibraltar, in a bid to choke off the funds that fuel Russian’s invasion of Ukraine.
Britain’s navy routinely conducts shadowing missions to monitor any potential threats to national security, including to critical infrastructure such as undersea cables or pipelines.
(Reporting by Muvija M; editing by Sarah Young)
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