Archive - Aug 25, 2008

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SEVASTOPOL, August 23 (RIA Novosti) - One more Russian ship returned Saturday from Georgian waters to the Black Sea Fleet's base in the Ukrainian port of Sevastopol. The mine-sweeper Turbinist had taken part in Russia's operations in Georgia. Mirage, a guided missile corvette, returned on Friday morning to the home port of the Russian Black Sea fleet after seeing action against Georgia’s port of Poti, where it shelled Georgian defenses and landed troops who occupied the city. Mirage was involved in the only reported maritime action of the campaign. It sank a Georgian fast patrol boat that had probed within range of its guns.

Rival groups of Russian and Ukrainian demonstrators hurled insults at each other to a background of cannon fire as the Russian navy’s Mirage sailed into Sebastopol on Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula. The celebratory gunfire could become all too real if fears are realized that Russia may repeat its incursion into Georgia and turn Ukraine into the next Caucasian flashpoint. Crimea has a Russian majority population and, because of its strategic importance, Moscow deeply resented its loss at the time of the break-up of the Soviet Union.

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