A Russian warship forcibly stopped and searched a civilian cargo ship en route to the Izmail port in Odesa region, likely as part of a Kremlin effort to curtail maritime traffic to Ukrainian ports without committing naval assets to fully enforce a blockade, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) has said on its report over August 13.

Regardless the facts that the Russian patrol ship forcibly stopped and searched a dry cargo ship sailing under the flag of Palau to Izmail and that the Russian Defense Ministry announced on July 19 that it would consider all ships en route to Ukrainian ports as potential military cargo carriers and the flag countries of such vessels as "involved in the Ukrainian conflict on the side of the Kyiv regime," Russian forces did not stop three civilian ships which openly advertised their destination as Ukraine over their ships' automatic identification system (AIS) on July 30.

"The reports of the three civilian ships sailing to Ukraine unhindered suggested that Russian forces may be unable or unwilling to forcibly stop and search neutral vessels, and Russian forces likely conducted their first forced inspection to reimpose the threat of escalation against civilian vessels en route to Ukraine. Russian forces also likely conducted the forced stop and inspection to undermine confidence in temporary trading corridors through the Black Sea to Ukrainian ports, which Ukrainian officials announced on August 10," the ISW said in the report.

According to the analysts, the Russian naval posturing in the Black Sea is likely intentionally ambiguous and seeks to create a chilling effect on civilian maritime traffic to Ukraine without requiring Russian forces to commit Black Sea Fleet assets to the enforcement of a naval blockade.

"The Russian military is likely less willing to commit the Black Sea Fleet to such a blockade than it was in July following notable Ukrainian strikes on Russian naval targets in the Black Sea and the Novorossiysk naval base in Krasnodar Krai in early August," the ISW said.