Royal Marines Board Russian Oil Tanker Smyrtos in English Channel in Britain’s First Shadow Fleet Strike (opens in new tab)

Royal Marine Commandos and National Crime Agency officers descended onto the Cameroon-flagged tanker Smyrtos from RAF Chinooks in the early hours of Sunday, seizing a vessel that left the Russian Baltic oil terminal at Ust-Luga on June 1 and had been stripped of its Cameroon flag registration just days before the raid. The operation — Britain's first direct boarding of a sanctioned shadow fleet vessel — hands Keir Starmer a rare display of kinetic resolve at a moment when his government faces...