This article is more than 8 years old

This article is more than 8 years old

Russia's apparent military support for the Syrian regime emerged on Wednesday when a Russian ship carrying 60 tonnes of arms for Damascus was stopped in Cyprus.

The MV Chariot, which set off from St Petersburg in early December, was forced to pull into the Greek Cypriot port of Limassol because of stormy seas. It had been on its way to Turkey and Syria, inspectors said.

Customs officials who boarded the ship discovered four containers. They were unable to open them but concluded that they contained a "dangerous cargo". State radio in Cyprus went further, alleging that the Chariot was carrying "tens of tonnes of munitions".

Russia is one of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad's few remaining international allies. Moscow resents what it regards as western encroachment on its traditional sphere of influence and has continued to supply Damascus with advanced weapons and other arms, to the annoyance of Washington.

For its part, Syria gives Russia a strategic foothold in the Mediterranean via a shared naval maintenance facility in the port of Tartus.

The cargo ship was apparently heading to the Syrian port city of Latakia. As well as blocking a UN resolution last October in the security council, condemning Syria's human rights resolutions, the Kremlin is sending its warships to call on Syrian ports this summer.

The Cypriot foreign ministry said the boat was allowed to continue its voyage after assurances from the Russian owners it would not go to Syria. The Chariot, a St Vincent and Grenadines-flagged ship, technically broke an EU arms embargo to Syria, imposed amid Assad's continued violent crackdown against peaceful demonstrators.

The embargo does not apply to Russia or Turkey, non-EU members. The vessel left , apparently en route to Turkey. Turkey, once a close partner of Syria, is now one of the regime's most strident critics, and has afforded refuge to its opposition leadership.

Cyprus's Greek-language Politis newspaper reported that the vessel was carrying ammunition of various calibres and that the recipient was the Syrian ministry of defence. Another newspaper, Simerini, said initial reports suggested it was carrying 35 tonnes of explosives, weapons and munitions.

Last summer Cyprus suffered a disaster after it confiscated munitions aboard another cargo ship heading to the Middle East. In February 2009 officials seized 85 gunpowder-filled containers from a Cypriot-flagged ship that was suspected of transporting them from Iran to Palestinian militants in Gaza through Syria.

Those containers, left piled in an open field at a naval base, blew up in July, killing 13 people and wrecking the island's main power station in the island's worst peacetime military accident.