Defence Secretary John Healey condemns the Yantar’s actions as ‘deeply harmful’ and says Britain is poised to react.
Revealed On 20 Nov 2025
The UK has warned it is able to use “navy choices” if obligatory after a Russian spy ship that has spent weeks on the sting of British waters directed lasers at British pilots despatched to watch the vessel.
In a speech in London on Wednesday, British Defence Secretary John Healey condemned the Yantar’s actions in opposition to royal air pressure (RAF) pilots as “deeply harmful” and stated Britain is poised to react relying on the vessel’s subsequent transfer.
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The defence secretary stated a UK naval frigate and RAF P-8 planes had been deployed to watch the ship, which is designed for intelligence gathering and mapping undersea cables, because it sailed in waters north of Scotland.
“My message to Russia and to [President Vladimir] Putin is that this: We see you. We all know what you’re doing. And if the Yantar travels south this week, we’re prepared,” Healey stated.
“That is the primary time we’ve had this motion from Yantar directed in opposition to the British RAF. We take it extraordinarily critically,” he added.
Healey continued that he had modified the navy’s guidelines of engagement to permit it to “monitor extra intently” the vessel’s actions.
“Now we have navy choices prepared ought to the Yantar change course,” he stated.
Britain’s air and naval forces routinely shadow potential threats close to its territorial waters and airspace. Incursions by Russian vessels and submarines have turn into extra frequent since Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
In an announcement responding to Healey’s accusations, the Russian embassy in London accused the British authorities of being “Russophobic” and “whipping up militaristic hysteria”.
Responding to what it described as “countless accusations”, it stated Moscow’s “actions don’t have an effect on the pursuits of the UK and are usually not aimed toward undermining its safety”.
“We’re not eager about British underwater communications,” it stated, urging Britain to “chorus from damaging steps that exacerbate the disaster phenomena on the European continent”.
The Yantar, which is designed to conduct surveillance in peacetime and sabotage throughout occasions of battle, in line with British officers, additionally investigated the UK’s defences in January because it sailed via the English Channel.
The royal navy dispatched two vessels to watch the spy vessel, which Healey stated was “loitering over UK vital undersea infrastructure” earlier than it departed for the Mediterranean.
Kremlin-linked vessels, a part of Russia’s so-called shadow fleet of sanctions-evading oil tankers, have been accused of finishing up assaults on pipelines and cables as a brand new type of underwater hybrid warfare.
In December, Finnish authorities seized a Russia-linked ship on suspicion that it deliberately broken an undersea energy cable within the Baltic Sea between Finland and Estonia.
Healey’s warning additionally got here as he made the case for elevated defence spending within the face of threats from Russia, China and Iran earlier than the disclosing of Britain’s new funds on November 26.
In June, Britain pledged to increase defence spending to 5 percent of its gross home product by 2035, greater than double final 12 months’s 2.3 % and in step with most different NATO nations.
As a part of that, Healey stated the UK plans to develop “13 potential websites” to fabricate munitions and explosives as a part of a 1.5-billion-pound (about $1.95bn) funding plan to create greater than 1,000 jobs.
“It is a new period of risk. It calls for a brand new period for defence, an period of onerous energy, robust allies and of positive diplomacy,’’ Healey stated. “And because the risk grows, Britain should step up, and we’re.”
