Russian taskforce arrives in Krasnodar as oil spill from tankers in Kerch Strait spreads

An emergency taskforce has arrived in Russia's southern Krasnodar region as an oil spill in the Kerch Strait from two storm-stricken tankers continues to spread a month after it was first detected.

The team, which includes Emergency Situations Minister Alexander Kurenkov, was set up after Russian President Vladimir Putin called on authorities on Friday to ramp up the response to the spill, calling it "one of the most serious environmental challenges we have faced in recent years."

Kurenkov said that a "most difficult situation" had developed near the port of Taman in the Krasnodar region, where fuel oil continues to leak into the sea from the damaged part of the Volgoneft-239 tanker.

Kurenkov was quoted as saying by Russian state news agency RIA Novosti that the remaining oil will be pumped out of the tanker's stern.

The Emergencies Ministry said that over 155,000 tons of contaminated sand and soil had been collected since oil spilled out of the tankers during a storm four weeks ago in the Kerch Strait, which separates the Russia-occupied Crimean Peninsula from the Krasnodar region.

Russian-installed officials in Ukraine’s partially Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia region said on Saturday that mazut, a heavy, low-quality oil product, had reached the Berdyansk Spit, some 145 kilometres north of the Kerch Strait.

It contaminated an area over 14km long, Moscow-installed Governor Yevgeny Balitsky wrote on Telegram.

Russian-appointed officials in Moscow-occupied Crimea announced a regional emergency last weekend after oil was detected on the shores of Sevastopol, the peninsula's largest city.

In response to Putin's call for action, Ukraine's Foreign Ministry spokesman Heorhii Tykhyi accused Russia of "beginning to demonstrate its concern only after the scale of the disaster became too obvious to conceal its terrible consequences."

"Russia's practice of first ignoring the problem, then admitting its inability to solve it, and ultimately leaving the entire Black Sea region alone with the consequences is yet another proof of its international irresponsibility," Tykhyi said on Friday.

Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to the head of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office, described the oil spill last month as a "large-scale environmental disaster" and called for additional sanctions on Russian tankers.

Annexing Crimea

The Kerch Strait is an important global shipping route, providing passage from the inland Sea of Azov to the Black Sea.

It has also been a key point of conflict between Russia and Ukraine after Moscow annexed the peninsula in 2014.

In 2016, Ukraine took Moscow to the Permanent Court of Arbitration, where it accused Russia of trying to seize control of the area illegally.

In 2021, Russia closed the strait for several months.