MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 26th May, 2019) Ukrainian Ambassador to Germany Andrij Melnyk said that if Moscow did not comply with the ruling of International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) which ordered Russia to release the Ukrainian sailors it detained last November, he would push for new sanctions against Moscow.
On Saturday, ITLOS ruled that Moscow must release the 24 sailors who were aboard the three Ukrainian vessels Russia intercepted when they crossed the Russian maritime border as they sailed toward the Kerch Strait.
"If Moscow does not suddenly perform the verdict of the International Maritime Tribunal, we will promote new-" Hamburg "-sanctions!" Melnyk tweeted on Saturday.
On November 25, Ukraine's Berdyansk and Nikopol gunboats, and the Yany Kapu tugboat illegally crossed the Russian maritime border as they sailed toward the Kerch Strait, the entrance to the Sea of Azov. Russia seized the Ukrainian vessels and detained crew members after they failed to respond to a demand to stop. After the incident, a criminal case on illegal border crossing was opened in Russia.
Moscow has repeatedly slammed Kiev's attempts to portray the detained sailors as prisoners of war, stressing that they faced criminal charges. Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the incident was a provocation prepared in advance as a pretext to declare martial law in Ukraine, which was announced after the incident and lasted for a month. Putin said the provocation might have been linked to then-Ukrainian leader Petro Poroshenko's low approval ratings before the presidential election, which his rival Volodymyr Zelensky ultimately won.
