WASHINGTON – The US Navy has started tracking a Russian spy ship off NorthCarolina, US officials say, days after the vessel departed a port inTrinidad and Tobago.
The Russian Navy’s Viktor Leonov ship was first spotted steaming ininternational waters 100 miles south east of Wilmington, North Carolina,CNN reported Monday night, citing two unnamed officials.
The ship is equipped with high-tech surveillance gear and can interceptcommunications signals, the report added.
Unnamed US military officials told CNN that the ship was observed operatingin the Caribbean last week and was expected to spend four-to-six monthconducting intelligence operations off the East Coast.
The Russian ship is being tracked by the destroyer USS Cole and other navalassets, the officials said.
This is apparently a routine mission, according to CNN, as the ship hadsailed along the same route in on several occasions last year.
Pentagon officials said the Viktor Leonov was spotted some 20 miles southof the US Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay near the Florida border last March.
The Vishnya-class ship was also spotted off the coast of Connecticut inFebruary 2017, lingering on international waters 30 miles away.
The Viktor Leonov performed similar missions in 2015 and 2014, the reportfurther claimed.
Last April, American Air Force officials said they had Russian militaryaircraft flying in international airspace off the coast of Alaska.
The first flight involved two IL-38 maritime patrol aircraft and the secondinvolved two Tu-95 nuclear-capable Bear bombers, which were flying aroundthe north coast of Alaska and Canada, according to NORAD.
The US and its allies in the NATO military alliance regularly conductspying missions off Russia’s borders, specially in the Baltic region.
Washington has also irked Russia by dispatching a strike group, includingan aircraft carrier, to the Korean Peninsula in response to North Korea’snuclear and missile programs.
The deployment prompted Moscow to dispatch intelligence gathering vesselsand chase the US naval task force