Putin’s warship may have fired both machine guns and ‘signal ammunition flares’ during a collision with a German helicopter, report claims – as Berlin ‘refuses to comment on ‘top secret’ incident’

A warship under the control of Vladimir Putin’s forces may have fired a machine gun and flares during a tense encounter with a German helicopter, a new report says.

Image reported that the Russian warship ‘Merkury’, a 104.5-meter corvette, fired signal ammunition flares as a German NH-90 SeaLion helicopter approached during the collision, which was reported earlier this week.

The SeaLion investigated the Merkury because it was suspected of being part of Russia’s so-called ‘Shadow Fleet’, a collection of seagoing vessels used to evade international sanctions.

The newspaper reported that as the SeaLion approached at an altitude of 300 meters, signal munitions were fired from a distance of about 7.4 kilometers before the Russian ship fired its machine gun into the water.

The Russian ship has reportedly apologized for the incident, but little more is known about the flare-up.

The German government has so far declined to comment, with Bild reporting that defense officials are investigating the incident as top secret.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock mentioned the incident at a NATO meeting but gave no further details.

NATO is currently conducting enhanced surveillance in the Baltic Sea to prevent hybrid attacks on pipelines and data cables by Russia and its supporters.

The Baltic Sea is bordered by eight NATO countries and Russia.

Since 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine, there have been at least three incidents of possible sabotage of the approximately 40 telecommunications cables and critical gas pipelines that run along the relatively shallow seabed.

“NATO is increasing patrols … allies are investing in innovative technologies that can help better secure these assets,” Commander Arlo Abrahamson, a spokesman for NATO’s Allied Maritime Command, said earlier.

But the ease with which a ship’s anchor can cut through a cable, combined with the often treacherous conditions at sea, makes actually preventing such attacks virtually impossible.

Tensions between Russia and the West have risen so high in recent weeks that defense chiefs from Russia and the US held a rare phone call last week.

Direct contact between Moscow and Washington is almost non-existent amid Russia’s military offensive on Ukraine, and the Kremlin has said it considers the United States a direct participant in the conflict.

The phone call between Russian Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov and US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Charles Brown took place on November 27 and took place at the request of the Russian side, both Moscow and Washington said.

“The leaders discussed a number of global and regional security issues, including the ongoing conflict in Ukraine,” Brown’s spokesman told AFP.

It was the first conversation between the pair since Brown took over the role in October 2023.

The Russian Defense Ministry said Gerasimov had briefed Brown on Russian military exercises in the eastern Mediterranean, announced as Moscow carries out airstrikes to support its ally and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad puts down an Islamist-led uprising.

“This information was given with the aim of preventing possible incidents related to the presence of US and NATO ships near the area where Russian exercises are being conducted,” the report said in a statement on Telegram.

There was no mention of Ukraine or any other topic.

Citing a US military spokesman, the New York Times reported that the pair discussed Russia’s new hypersonic ballistic missile Oreshnik.

Brown also expressed U.S. concerns about the deployment of North Korean troops to support the Russian military on the battlefield, CNN reported.

Despite the West’s reluctance to comment on the issue for fear of further escalation, Russia has been reluctant to use fiery language to stoke tensions.

Former Russian President and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev even declared late last month that NATO and the US are at “all-out war” with Russia.

Medvedev declared that the West has crossed “all red lines” and is now “at war with Russia.”

Putin’s close ally, who is now deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, said any Ukrainian attack on Russian territory with Western weapons would be met with a response.

‘It will not go unnoticed… It will change the rules of engagement – ​​it is proof that NATO and Washington and other participants in the alliance are participating not just in a hybrid war, but a war in every sense of the word against our country.

“The negotiations are still a long way off, events like this could push those negotiations back even further,” he told Al-Arabiya in Saudi Arabia.

“Any attack on Russia is unequivocally unacceptable. What happened was a crossing of all red lines.’