Chinese container ship has made four port calls in occupied Crimea since June

The container ship manipulates its position data in the AIS transmission system to hide the real port where loading is taking place.

The Chinese container ship has called at Sevastopol in the temporarily occupied Crimea four times since June, and Russia has been shipping containerized goods from this port for export.

This was reported by Lloyd’s List.

“According to our information, the Chinese container ship Heng Yang 9 (IMO: 1059979) has made four calls since June, spoofing its automatic identification signal,” the message says.

The container ship, owned by the Chinese and flying the Panamanian flag, is manipulating its position data in the AIS transmission system (using spoofing) to hide the real port where the loading is taking place, the publication notes.

“Russia has resumed shipping containers from Sevastopol. Previously, trade was limited to agricultural goods,” Lloyd’s List writes.

The publication suggests that the containers for export included products from the temporarily occupied Donbas, which were delivered to the port by rail.

“Meanwhile, Mariupol and Berdyansk, which came under the control of the Kremlin in 2022, were officially declared open to foreign shipping. This is a clear attempt to show these ports as part of the Russian Federation. But from a legal and ethical point of view, this is not so,” the publication says.