Estonian Naval Forces Try to Force Civilian Ship Jaguar into Territorial Waters

Today in the Gulf of Finland, several ships from the Estonian Navy attempted to force the civilian vessel Jaguar to change course and enter the country’s territorial waters, according to reports from Telegram channels Dobry Moryachok and RaZved_DoZor. These sources claim that the Jaguar, flying the flag of Gabon, was in international waters at the time of the incident.

The channels assert that Estonia deployed significant resources for the operation, including the patrol boat Raju (confirmed by MarineTraffic data), the patrol boat Kurvits, an amphibious helicopter, and a PZL M28 aircraft. NATO aircraft—specifically Polish Air Force MiG-29s – were also reportedly involved in the attempted interception. The channels shared videos allegedly filmed by the Jaguar crew as evidence.

The Insider confirmed, using Sentinel navigation charts and data from the tracking service MarineTraffic, that the Jaguar was indeed located in neutral waters during its encounter with the Estonian patrol boat Kurvits.

However, the video shared by the Telegram channels shows coordinates on the vessel’s navigation display indicating that, at the time of filming, the ship was positioned just south of the neutral waters boundary – within Estonia’s territorial waters. Estonian naval vessels continued to track the Jaguar as it moved into international waters.

The vessel is listed by Ukrainian intelligence and the international NGO Greenpeace as part of Russia’s “shadow fleet” – a collection of poorly maintained, aging tankers used to transport oil above the $60-per-barrel price cap set in December 2022 by the G7 countries, the EU, and Australia. This fleet has allowed the Kremlin to continue financing its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which entered its fourth year in February 2025.

According to reports on Telegram, Estonian forces attempted twice to land a boarding team from a helicopter onto the Jaguar. However, the ship’s crew allegedly prevented the inspection team from boarding and continued on their course to the port of Primorsk in Russia’s Leningrad Region. Reports also claimed that a Russian Su-35 fighter jet arrived to escort the vessel into Russian territorial waters.

Norwegian military analyst Thord Are Iversen writes that, according to ship-tracking services, the Jaguar did indeed disobey Estonian commands and is currently anchored near Gogland Island, which is part of Russian territory in the Gulf of Finland. He notes that the video footage shared by Russian channels “seems legit” and confirms that an Estonian naval ship was in close proximity to the Jaguar during the incident.

This is not the first time the Estonian Navy has undertaken such actions. On April 11, Estonian authorities detained the tanker Kiwala, also linked to the Russian “shadow fleet.” At the time of its detention, the tanker was flying the flag of Djibouti, although Djiboutian authorities initially denied that the vessel was registered with them, according to Estonian officials. The ship was released after the Estonian Transport Authority received a letter confirming that Djibouti would accept the vessel into its registry. The Russia-bound Kiwala was eventually released on April 28.

In January, German authorities towed the drifting tanker Eventin, another suspected Russian “shadow fleet” tanker, to shore after it suffered a power failure. The German federal government then confiscated the vessel—along with $40 million worth of its crude oil cargo—and replaced its crew, taking full control of the ship.