Finland’s military says it detected “a strike” on a Russian warship in the Gulf of Finland on Wednesday, as Ukraine sent waves of drones towards Russia’s northwestern Leningrad region.
The strike came as Russian and Ukrainian delegations met in Abu Dhabi for their first United States-brokered talks since February.
It was a rare strike on a Russian navy vessel in the Baltic Sea.
So why is Ukraine taking the war to the Baltic, and why now? Here’s what we know:
What happened?
“The Finnish Defence Forces detected… a strike on a Russian warship in the Gulf of Finland area and has monitored the development of the situation,” a military spokesperson told the Reuters news agency in an emailed statement.
The spokesperson said Finland was not under any immediate military threat, but declined to say where or when the incident happened, or how it had been detected.
It was not immediately clear whether there were any casualties. Estonian media reported that the vessel was a small Russian navy ship that later returned to St Petersburg.
On Wednesday, drones also caused a fire in the Russian port area of Ust-Luga, injuring three workers, regional Governor Aleksandr Drozdenko said.
Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania told citizens to take shelter as drones strayed into their airspace, and NATO scrambled warplanes in response.
Why is the location important?
The Gulf of Finland is a narrow arm of the Baltic Sea between Finland and Estonia, both NATO members, that extends east to St Petersburg. Ust-Luga, on its southern shore, is a key export outlet for Russian oil and grain.
Several Ukrainian drones deployed towards the Leningrad region have strayed into the airspace of Finland and the Baltic states, raising fears that the war is spilling over into NATO countries that border Russia.
Finland’s Defence Minister Antti Hakkanen said Helsinki had raised the strike with Kyiv.
“We have told the Ukrainians this time, and a little earlier too, how sensitive this narrow stretch of the Gulf of Finland, right between us and Estonia, is in terms of environmental safety and the safety of civilian shipping,” he said, according to Finnish broadcaster Yle.
But he said the spillover effects in the surrounding region stem from Ukraine’s defensive fight and assured the public the Baltic Sea around Finland was still safe.
“You can still cruise with peace of mind,” he said.
Ilya Timtchenko, a fellow with the Transatlantic Defense and Security Program at the Center for European Policy Analysis, told Al Jazeera the strike was thought to be the first by Ukrainian forces on a Russian ship in an area of the Baltic used by civilian traffic.
“Ukraine and its European allies are showing that they are unified in their approach to fighting off the Russian threat,” he told Al Jazeera.
What has Ukraine said?
Ukraine’s Security Service said it attacked the Buyan-M-class small missile ship, Naro-Fominsk, as part of a special operation, according to Yle.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s General Staff said the strike on Ust-Luga had damaged five fuel tanks.
“According to preliminary information, as a result of drone strikes on the port’s oil infrastructure, the tank network suffered the most damage,” it reported on Telegram.
On Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner in Ireland and praised their mediation efforts.
What talks are ongoing?
Russia, Ukraine and the US held two days of talks in Abu Dhabi on Tuesday and Wednesday. The last such talks took place in February this year.
The talks produced no breakthrough, apart from an agreement to swap a large number of prisoners. Russia’s state-run TASS news agency said the exchange should happen in two to three weeks.
Territory remains the main sticking point.
Ukraine wants Russia pushed back to the original border between the two countries, while Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to control all of Ukraine’s Donbas region.
Moscow’s demands reach beyond Ukraine as well, focusing also on the expansion of NATO.
Russian negotiators proposed in Abu Dhabi that Finland, which joined the alliance in ۲۰۲۳, leave NATO and that the alliance be barred from having military bases in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, the German newspaper Bild reported on Friday.
The informal proposals, shared with European representatives, also called for arrangements to guarantee freedom of navigation in the Black Sea and the Baltic Sea, Bild reported.
On Thursday, Witkoff and Kushner met Putin in Moscow, where the two sides agreed to continue the talks, before the envoys met Zelenskyy in Ireland.
Why has Ukraine carried out attacks during talks?
To keep up the pressure on Moscow.
“Kyiv continues to demonstrate two points simultaneously: That it is willing to negotiate and that it has a position of strength,” Timtchenko said. “In parallel with any peace talks, Ukraine will likely continue to strike Russia’s military and the sources of funding for Russia’s war machine.”
Ukraine has repeatedly targeted Russian refineries, ports, and energy infrastructure to raise the economic cost of Moscow’s war effort.
But the strikes have drawn criticism from Washington. Trump has blamed Ukraine’s attacks on Russian energy infrastructure for rising diesel prices, and last month he waived sanctions on Russia that Congress had overwhelmingly approved.
Timtchenko said the strikes still gave Kyiv leverage. “Long-range strikes considerably strengthen Ukraine’s hand at the negotiating table, which is why Russian officials keep bringing them up,” he said.
How has Moscow responded?
Russia has not commented publicly on the reported strike on its warship.
Governor Drozdenko said ۱۵۰ drones were shot down over the Leningrad region during Wednesday’s attack, which also cut off a power station.
“Moscow might voice harsh rhetoric and try to blame the Ukrainians for undermining the peace talks,” Timtchenko said. “However, this is nothing new, since Russia has done this numerous times before.
“Despite Moscow’s pretence of seeking an end to the war, Russia continues to strike Ukraine’s military, critical infrastructure, and civilians,” he added.
