Five Azerbaijani crew members were killed and three were wounded in an overnight attack on two commercial ships in Taganrog Bay, Azerbaijan's Foreign Ministry said. The ministry did not identify who carried out the strike, and the supplied account contained no independent confirmation of responsibility.
The vessels were named as the Natra and the Zircon. Although neither ship was Azerbaijani state property, the ministry said their combined crews included 25 Azerbaijani nationals. The incident occurred early in the morning in the bay, a narrow northeastern section of the Sea of Azov bounded by Russia's Rostov and Krasnodar regions.
Officials in Baku said government bodies and Azerbaijani diplomatic posts were working with authorities in the relevant countries on the emergency response. Staff from Azerbaijan's embassy in Moscow travelled to the area to follow the treatment of injured sailors and organize the return of those who died. The evidence did not specify the wounded crew members' conditions, their hospitals or the vessels' flags, cargoes and destinations.
The Moscow Times described the incident as a drone attack. It said Russian officials had not issued a formal public account of the strikes on the ships at the time of its report. Izvestia, citing an unnamed source, separately reported that six people had been hospitalized. That figure differs from the three wounded announced by Azerbaijan's ministry, and the supplied material does not explain whether it included people outside the Azerbaijani crew or reflected an earlier count.
The maritime incident came during a broader night of attacks reported by Russian authorities. Russia's Defence Ministry claimed that its forces intercepted 123 Ukrainian drones from Thursday night into Friday morning. It located those interceptions across nine Russian regions as well as the Sea of Azov and Russian-annexed Crimea. That assertion does not, by itself, establish which force struck the Natra and Zircon. Azerbaijan's decision not to assign blame in its statement is therefore significant.
In a separate event in Belgorod region, local authorities said a drone hit a business in Otradovsky, killing one man and injuring another. The village lies about 15 kilometres east of the border with Ukraine's Sumy region. The supplied report did not connect that casualty incident operationally to the ship strikes beyond placing both within the same overnight period.
The confirmed core of Azerbaijan's announcement is the nationality and number of affected crew members, the two vessel names and the diplomatic response. Key facts remain unsettled, including attribution, the weapons that hit each ship, damage to the vessels and whether all casualties were on board at the moment of impact. Any conclusion about responsibility would go beyond the ministry's stated position and the available evidence.
