Kiev/Moscow - Elements of Russia's Black Sea fleet shifted locations on Wednesday in an possible move to avoid a confrontation with a growing NATO warship flotilla near Georgia. Russian naval vessels operating off of Georgia's coastline had moved from a station in the vicinity of the Georgian port Poti into "Abkhazian territorial waters," said Sergei Menialo, commander of Russia's Novorossisk naval base, according to an Interfax news agency report.
The shift took a group of some six to eight Russian warships that had been patrolling near the Georgian port of Poti out of the path of US warships reportedly planning to make a humanitarian aid delivery to the same location.
American officials on Tuesday said elements of the US 6th Fleet would bring humanitarian aid to Poti for delivery to Georgian refugees from the Russo-Georgian war.
The announcement put Washington on track for a Cold War-style naval confrontation with Moscow, as elements of Russia's Black Sea fleet have been enforcing a partial blockade on Poti since early August.
The Russian squadron now off shore and tied up at Abkhazia, a renegade Georgian province adjacent to the Georgia-owned port Poti, was delivering humanitarian and other forms of aid via the Abkhazian port Sukhumi, Menialo said.
The Russian guided missile cruiser and Black Sea fleet flagship Moscow cancelled a planned return to its hope port Sevastopol in Ukraine's Crimea peninsula, was at a Sukhumi pier as part of the Russian naval operation, he added.
The Moscow, the largest warship operating on the Black Sea, visited Sevastopol over the weekend, reloaded armaments and supplies, and returned to sea immediately, Ukrainian naval intelligence sources reported.
NATO led by the US began a dramatic increase to its naval presence in the Black Sea in mid-August, after Russian refusal to abide by a Russo-Georgian ceasefire plan engineered by French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
The agreement among other conditions obliged all Russian and Georgian forces to return to pre-war positions - a stipulation the Kremlin has in some cases ignored.
Russian forces landed in early August near Poti now conduct patrols into the port and continue hold road checkpoints inland. The Russian occupation has made impossible most sea shipments between Georgia and the rest of the world.
The NATO flotilla led by the American destroyer USS McFaul already has exceeded ten warships and will reach eighteen vessels in coming days, Kremlin officials citing Russian intelligence said Tuesday.
German, Polish, Spanish, and Canadian warships are among the members of the multi-national squadron being assembled in the Black Sea, according to Georgian media reports.
Russian admiral Sergei Kasatonov admitted the growing NATO naval formation would soon be stronger than the Russian Black Sea warships off Georgia and Abkhazia's shore, but added the Kremlin could in case of a confrontation deal with the western vessels "using other forms of combat power, including aviation assets."
Kasatonov's comments made in Moscow were among the first public statements by a top Russian official of possible naval combat between Russian and NATO forces in the Black Sea.
The motivation for the increasing NATO naval presence in the region was "primarily political and not military," he added.
