Naval commander shot dead, claims Ukraine

First rank captain Andrei Paliy, 51, was head of political military activities for the fleet and first senior naval officer to be killed.

Ukrainian forces claim to have shot dead the deputy commander of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, said to be the first death of a senior naval officer in the war.

First rank captain Andrei Paliy, 51, was head of political military activities for the fleet, which has been shelling Ukrainian cities and stopping cargo ships from reaching the country’s ports.

He was allegedly killed while involved in Russian marine attacks near the besieged port city of Mariupol, but the exact circumstances of his reported death are not known. The armed forces of Ukraine named Captain Paliy on Sunday, saying they had ­“liquidated the deputy commander of the Black Sea Fleet”.

Ukraine Internal Affairs Minister Anton Gerashchenko and ­former ambassador to Austria Olexander Scherba also said the officer had been killed, without giving further details. “Andrey Paliy ain’t coming home from Ukraine,” Mr Scherba tweeted.

Moscow did not immediately acknowledge his death, but Konstantin Tsarenko, secretary of the public council at Nakhimov Naval Academy in Sevastopol, also reported that he had been killed.

Captain Paliy is the only senior Russian naval officer allegedly killed since Ukraine was invaded more than three weeks ago, though he is among a handful of top-ranking military targets Kyiv claims to have eliminated.

Ukrainian forces say they have killed five army commanders, including Colonel Sergei Sukharev, of the 331st Guards Parachute Assault Regiment, who died on March 18, and Major General Andrei Sukhovetsky, 47, who was shot by a sniper on March 3. Other prominent deaths include Major General Oleg Mityaev, 47, commander of the army’s 150th motorised rifle division, who was killed fighting around Mariupol; Major General Vitaly Gerasimov, 45, who was killed outside the eastern city of Kharkiv; and Colonel Andrei Kolesnikov, commander of the Guards Tank Kantemirovskaya Division.

Captain Paliy was born in Kyiv but did not take the Ukrainian military oath and instead chose to serve in the Russian Northern Fleet.

The Times