Russian and British forces square off in the Black Sea

THE LASTHMS time that Russia fired on a British warship was in 1919, when a Bolshevik submarine torpedoed a destroyer in the Gulf of Finland. The last time it happened in the Black Sea was during the Crimean war over 165 years ago. So it was a surprise when Russia declared that it had not only fired warning shots at , a British destroyer passing through Crimean waters on June 23rd, but had also dropped bombs in its path.The sequence of events is contested. Russia says that the British warship crossed 3km (two miles) into its territorial waters off Crimea, near Cape Fiolent (see map). When the Soviet Union broke up, Crimea became part of Ukraine. Russia occupied and annexed it in 2014. It thus claims the patch of sea in question, even though most countries, including Britain, regard the annexation as illegal. Russia said it “halted the violation” with warning fire and, 11 minutes later, with bombs dropped from Su-24 bombers.