Turkey Cuts Off Russia’s Black Sea Lifeline — Straits Blocked, Moscow in Crisis | Rachal Meddow

#Turkey #BlackSea #Russia #Crimea #Putin #Zelensky #ShadowFleet #TB2

Tonight, the Black Sea stopped being “Russia’s lake.”

While cameras captured Zelensky and Erdogan smiling for the press, something far more consequential was unfolding behind the scenes. Turkey is no longer playing neutral. Ankara is quietly tightening its grip on the one lifeline that keeps Putin’s war machine alive: the Bosphorus Strait.

This report breaks down how a “simple” cruise ship delay, an 84-hour hostage-level ferry inspection in Sochi, and a Russian drone strike on a Turkish-flagged LPG tanker pushed Turkey past its red line — and how Ankara is now hitting back where it hurts most: Russian oil exports.

We walk through how aggressive inspections on Russia’s shadow tanker fleet, new LNG deals with the United States, and the legal power of the Montreux Convention allow Turkey to choke off billions in Kremlin revenue without firing a single shot.

But that’s only half the story.

At the Crimea Platform summit, Turkey openly backed Ukraine’s claim to Crimea and signed the New York Declaration, targeting not only Russian oligarchs but the entire sanctions-dodging ecosystem that keeps Moscow funded.

🔥 This analysis covers:

How Turkey is trapping Russian ships in the straits

Why Moscow cannot bypass the Montreux Convention

How tanker inspections are costing Russia billions

Turkey’s LNG realignment with the U.S.

A collapsing Black Sea Fleet and port-to-port sanctions pressure

The geopolitical shift nobody saw coming

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