At 170 metres long, with a red hull, white painted superstructure and towering deck cranes, the Matros Koshka is difficult to miss.
But the bulk carrier – whose name means “the sailor cat” in Russian – has not been seen since it turned off its transponder in the middle of the Black Sea three weeks ago.
The vanishing ship is one of nearly a dozen Russian and Syrian flagged vessels at the centre of what Western governments believe is large-scale smuggling of looted Ukrainian grain.
