After forcing it to sail in circles offshore for more than a week, Syrian authorities permitted Russian naval cargo ships into the port Tartus on Wednesday, as once-powerful Kremlin military presence in the eastern Mediterranean unraveled further.
The Russian cargo ship Sparta III, a Ro-Ro carrier long deployed in logistical support to Russian naval units operating in the Mediterranean, had received permission to enter Tartus port and was taking aboard Russian military equipment awaiting evacuation there, the security research group Arab-Military reported.
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Data published by open-source ship tracking group Marinetraffic showed the Sparta III and its sister ship Sparta I tied up at the central wharf of a naval base area in Tartus port, a base leased and operated by the Russian military since the 1970s. The independent satellite imagery analyst MT Anderson on Wednesday likewise reported both ships seemed en route to the port.
The latest lease for the facility was signed into effect in 2017 by then Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Russian President Vladimir Putin. The deal extended for 49 years Russian access to the Kremlin’s only major naval and military logistics support base outside Russia. In exchange, Russia paid Syria nothing but Russian corporations were to invest $500 million in developing port infrastructure. A Russian company was to manage and draw income from the port’s operation.
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Tartus Customs Director Riyad Judi, in Tuesday comments to the Qatari newspaper al-Watan, said that the new Syrian government had unilaterally canceled the Tartus port deal, that all revenues from managing the port will go “to the Syrian state,” and that port workers will be employed by local management. He said the Russian company, since 2017, used existing port equipment without upgrading it per contract terms, which nullified the leasing agreement.
Neither Moscow nor Damascus had by Wednesday officially stated Russian naval access to Tartus would end or continue.
Local media, in contrast, has widely reported the new Syrian government led by the former insurgent group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) wants Russia’s military presence in Syria ended and Moscow’s influence reduced to a minimum.
Ukrainian military information platforms on Wednesday reported the military basing lease between Damascus and Moscow was ended, the widely-read MilitaryNewsUa saying in part: “The new Syrian authorities have officially terminated the agreement with the Russian side on the lease of the port of Tartus.”
On Jan. 17, Syria’s Finance Ministry announced it was banning trade between Syria and three countries – Iran, Israel and Russia – and warned any goods in that now-illegal trade would be confiscated by authorities.
Satellite overflights, since December and the fall of the al-Assad regime, had documented a rapid draw-down of Russian military presence in northern Syria, and the reduction of troops and aircraft at the Russia-operated Kheimim air base to a skeleton force. Syrian government militia associated with HTS took over control of access to the airfield in early January.
Open-source overhead images have documented hundreds of Russian military vehicles parked in rows stretching more than a kilometer inside Tartus port, likely awaiting evacuation. Syrian government coast guard took control of sea access to the port in the first half of January.
Syrian authorities reportedly blocked access for Russian transport ships into the port as a leverage tactic to pressure Moscow to pull all its forces out of the country.
Open-source trackers, aside from the two Sparta civilian ships, identified a tanker frequently supporting Russian naval operations in the Mediterranean and two Russian naval assault ships sailing in circles in international waters outside Tartus while those talks were in progress.
The two Russian warships, the Ivan Gren and Alexander Otrakovsky, in the past, have sailed without GPS trackers turned on. Their location was not shown on marine traffic on Wednesday. The last open-source fix on the tanker, the General Skobolev, was on Wednesday nine days old and placed the vessel offshore of Tartus, the group vessel.finder showed.
According to the Ukrainian strategic researcher Petro Andriuchshenko, the fall of the al-Assad regime and impending Russian exit from Syria may also have compromised Russian plans to convert the Azov Sea port Berdyansk, in occupied Ukrainian territory, into a transportation hub for Russian business to move Ukrainian grain to Syria.
In a Friday analysis, Andriushchenko reported Russia’s Federal Customs Service (FMS), headquartered in Russia’s Krasnodar region, in August 2024, opened a branch office in Berdyansk port, which would, he said, have enabled Russian exporters to disguise grain raised in and illicitly exported from Ukrainian territory occupied by Russia. The al-Assad regime was to receive the shipments.
The exported grain would evade longstanding worldwide bans on looting an invaded country by certifying the Ukrainian product, mostly wheat and soybeans, had actually been raised in Russia – a fiction that legitime importers would question but not the al-Assad regime, Andriushchenko said.
The collapse of the al-Assad government has reduced customer options for Moscow but work at Berdyansk port is going forward because Middle Eastern states like Egypt might also be willing not to look too closely at grain shipments departing Berdyansk port, the report said.
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