Russian cargo ship Yuriy Arshenevskiy sails from Tobruk to Turkish waters after arms delivery
She had sailed from Baltiysk with the sanctioned Anastasiia under escort of the landing ship Aleksandr Shabalin
The Russian-flagged cargo ship Yuriy Arshenevskiy, IMO 8406705, has left the Libyan port of Tobruk and sailed north through the Dardanelles, breaking away from the convoy that brought her there. She passed through the strait with her AIS switched on late on 24 September and was approaching the Bosporus early on 25 September before changing course for the anchorage or port at Tuzla.
She had sailed with the US-sanctioned cargo ship Anastasiia, IMO 9349291, escorted by the Ropucha-class landing ship Aleksandr Shabalin (L110), from the Baltic Fleet base at Baltiysk in Kaliningrad. The convoy passed the Strait of Gibraltar in early September. Ural trucks and armoured vehicles were seen being loaded onto the two cargo ships on the quay at Baltiysk.
In Tobruk, images posted on social media showed tarpaulin-covered military vehicles, including what appeared to be eight-wheeled armoured personnel carriers and multiple rocket launchers, being driven out of the port on low loaders. Tobruk is controlled by Field Marshal Haftar's Libyan National Army. Turkey backs the other side in the Libyan civil war, the UN-recognised government in Tripoli.
It is not clear when Anastasiia and the landing ship left Tobruk. Low-resolution imagery suggests Anastasiia was still at the quay on 21 September; by 25 September she was heading west between Sicily and Malta.
Yuriy Arshenevskiy is not herself under sanctions, contrary to some earlier reports. Sanctioned status would not in any case bar a transit of the Bosporus: Turkey, unlike Iran, strictly applies the UNCLOS rules on innocent passage through narrow straits.
A passage into the Black Sea would take her into waters where Ukraine has repeatedly struck Russian-flagged ships. On 22 September the commander of Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Force, Robert Brovdi, said his forces had disabled 300 vessels supporting Russia since 6 July, 134 in the Sea of Azov and 166 in the Black Sea, most of them fuel tankers and dry bulk carriers.
This story is part of the Maritime Briefing of 28 September 2026.
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