Why is Ukraine attacking Russian warships in the Baltic Sea amid talks?

Detailed summary

Finland says Ukraine struck a Russian warship near its coast as Kyiv and Moscow held US-brokered talks in Abu Dhabi.

Finland’s military says it detected “a strike” on a Russian warship in the Gulf of Finland on Wednesday, as Ukraine sent waves of drones towards Russia’s northwestern Leningrad region.

The strike came as Russian and Ukrainian delegations met in Abu Dhabi for their first United States-brokered talks since February.

So why is Ukraine taking the war to the Baltic, and why now? Here’s what we know:

“The Finnish Defence Forces detected… a strike on a Russian warship in the Gulf of Finland area and has monitored the development of the situation,” a military spokesperson told the Reuters news agency in an emailed statement.

The spokesperson said Finland was not under any immediate military threat, but declined to say where or when the incident happened, or how it had been detected.

It was not immediately clear whether there were any casualties. Estonian media reported that the vessel was a small Russian navy ship that later returned to St Petersburg.

On Wednesday, drones also caused a fire in the Russian port area of Ust-Luga, injuring three workers, regional Governor Aleksandr Drozdenko said.

Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania told citizens to take shelter as drones strayed into their airspace, and NATO scrambled warplanes in response.

The Gulf of Finland is a narrow arm of the Baltic Sea between Finland and Estonia, both NATO members, that extends east to St Petersburg. Ust-Luga, on its southern shore, is a key export outlet for Russian oil and grain.

Opening of the article, excerpted from Al Jazeera. To read the rest, open the article on the publisher's site.