Russia reveals casualties in sinking of flagship Moskva

According to RT, the above announcement was made by the Russian Ministry of Defense on April 22. The Ministry of Defense said: "During the incident handling process, one serviceman was killed, 27 sailors went missing, the remaining 396 crew members were evacuated from the cruiser to ships of the Black Sea Fleet in the area and taken to Sevastopol."

The Russian Defense Ministry added that the vast majority of officers and sailors serving on the flagship Moskva have expressed their desire to continue serving on ships of the Black Sea Fleet.

Some soldiers who wish to transfer to other garrisons will continue to serve on ships of other fleets.

The Russian Defense Ministry said it was providing support and assistance to relatives and friends of those killed and missing after the Moskva flagship incident.

The Russian military earlier said the Moskva flagship sank while being towed to port in stormy sea conditions. The Defense Ministry said the warship's hull was damaged by an ammunition explosion caused by a fire on board.

In response to the Russian military's statement about the fire on the Moskva flagship, Ukraine said that the ship was hit by a Ukrainian anti-ship missile. The head of the Odessa regional military administration, Maxim Marchenko, said that the very serious damage to the Moskva flagship was caused by a Ukrainian Neptune missile fired from Odessa.

Russia sent troops into Ukraine in late February after Ukraine failed to implement the terms of the Minsk agreement. Russia has recognized the self-proclaimed republics of the Donbass region of Donetsk and Lugansk.

The Kremlin has since demanded that Ukraine formally declare itself a neutral country that will never join the US-led NATO military bloc. Kiev insists Russia's attack was completely unprovoked and denies claims it is planning to retake the two republics by force.

The Moskva has a displacement of 12,500 tons and is equipped with many anti-ship and anti-aircraft missiles. The Moskva is the only Slava-class cruiser of the Black Sea Fleet. The Russian Navy has two similar warships, Marshal Ustinov and Varyag, which are assigned to the Northern Fleet and the Pacific Fleet, respectively.

The Moskva cruiser was designed and built at the Mykolai shipyard in Ukraine, Soviet Union in 1979. The main purpose of this project was to counter US aircraft carrier groups, creating air defense capabilities for Soviet warships operating in distant waters. At that time, the Moskva warship was known as the "aircraft carrier killer".

The US-based Institute for the Study of War (IOW), which monitors the Ukraine conflict, said it could not yet assess whether the Moskva warship sank due to a Ukrainian missile strike or another incident.

From a military perspective, the loss of the Moskva flagship is not too serious for Russia. According to IOW, this cruiser is mainly used to carry out Kalibr cruise missile attacks on Ukrainian military facilities and targets, such as logistics centers and airport runways.

“Russian Kalibr missile launches from warships are also effective, but in much more limited numbers than bomber strikes. The sinking of the Moskva is not a major loss,” IOW said.

Russian military experts have a similar assessment. “The ship is really old. In fact, Russia has plans to scrap it in the next five years… The ship has a symbolic, glorified value rather than a real combat value. In general, the sinking of the ship will not affect the current military operation,” Russian military analyst Alexander Khramchikhin told Reuters.

The Moskva took part in the brief naval blockade of Ukraine in March 2014, following Russia’s annexation of Crimea. In 2015, the ship was deployed to the Syrian coast, supporting Russia’s military campaign in the Middle Eastern country, providing air defense cover for Russian forces stationed in Syria.