Russia-Ukraine sea clash

•  Russia’s capture of three Ukrainian naval ships and over 20 crew members in the disputed Azov Sea has refocussed international attention on the conflict on Europe’s eastern corridors and Azov sea.
• The incident has drawn strong criticism of Russia by the United States and its allies and has fueled fears of wider fighting in the region.
• It's part of the long-simmering conflict between the two countries, in which Russia annexed Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in 2014 and supported separatists in Ukraine's east with clandestine dispatches of troops and weapons. That fighting has killed at least 10,000 people since 2014 but eased somewhat with a 2015 truce.

About Dispute:

• The Kerch Strait is the only connection between the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, and the only way to reach two important Ukrainian ports, Mariupol and Berdiansk. Russia has controlled the strait since annexing Crimea in 2014, which has made traffic significantly more difficult for Ukrainian ships.
• A treaty was also signed between both countries in 2003 under which Russia has the right to inspect any vessel sailing to or from the Sea of Azov. Ukraine has accused Russia of abusing that right.
• Ukraine has also opposed a Russian-constructed bridge that crosses the Kerch strait and connects Russia and Crimea.
• Neither Ukraine nor the European Union nor the United States recognise Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea. Kremlin-backed forces seized control of the Crimean peninsula and the territory voted to join Russia in a referendum that Ukraine and the international community deem illegal.

The law of the sea

• The UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) sets out various scenarios that give a state freedom of passage, irrespective of a state's territorial waters.
• All ships, including foreign warships, enjoy the right of "innocent passage" within another state's territorial sea under international law.
• Russia has disputed whether the passage was innocent. The UN law states that a passage is innocent "so long as it is not prejudicial to the peace, good order or security of the coastal state". That includes threat or use of force, exercise or practice with weapons or any act of propaganda affecting the security of the state.
• Under international law, a country would have the right to seize another warship only if the warship was acting in a hostile manner.
• Also under UN conventions there is a requirement under which all ships needs to be given the freedom to travel through a strait from one part of the high seas to another - known as transit passage.
• There are also rules within the UN convention that "ensure that ports which can only be reached by a single route through the strait, as is true of all ports in the Sea of Azov, always remain accessible.

By: Vishal