Ukraine attacks forced Black Sea Fleet to move warships from Sevastopol, Russian official says

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MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia’s Black Sea Fleet has been forced to move many warships from the naval base of Sevastopol on the Crimean peninsular, which Russia annexed in 2014, due to attacks by Ukraine, a Russian-installed official was quoted as saying on Sunday.

The remarks by Dmitry Rogozin, a Russian-installed senator for the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia region and a former head of Russia’s space agency, are the first Russian official confirmation that the fleet has had to move from Sevastopol.

Ukraine has repeatedly said its attacks on Russian warships in the Black Sea have forced Moscow to move ships to Novorossiisk.

Rogozin told the Moskovsky Komsomolets newspaper that Russia needed to get more serious about its drone development, the organisation of its military drone units and the development of electronic warfare and satellite positioning systems.

“A military-technical revolution is taking place before our very eyes,” Rogozin said of the development of drones and electronic warfare, adding that the pace of innovation was changing the situation at the front every month.

“The Black Sea Fleet is an illustrative example,” Rogozin was quoted as saying. “It was forced to change, basically, its residence due to the fact that our large ships became just big targets for unmanned enemy boats.”

Russia had been behind on drone technology at the start of the 2022 war, and although it has since made significant advances, it needed to move faster, particularly in the focus of its weapons spending and the creation of special drone regiments, Rogozin said.

He said satellite and surface guidance systems that could overcome electronic warfare were of particular importance to allow accurate targetting.

(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge; editing by Barbara Lewis)