A sailor looks out into the open water through his binoculars (Picture: Royal Navy)
A sailor looks out into the open water through his binoculars (Picture: Royal Navy)
The P2000 crews knuckled down on Exercise Eastern Sea, which ran through a range of likely scenarios (Picture: Royal Navy)
The P2000 crews knuckled down on Exercise Eastern Sea, which ran through a range of likely scenarios (Picture: Royal Navy)
Royal Navy and Latvian personnel talk to each other on the exercise (Picture: Royal Navy)
Royal Navy and Latvian personnel talk to each other on the exercise (Picture: Royal Navy)
The sun shimmered on the water as the vessels worked together (Picture: Royal Navy)
The sun shimmered on the water as the vessels worked together (Picture: Royal Navy)
Ex Eastern Sea ended with the four British boats sailing the short distance up to Latvia's capital, Riga (Picture: Royal Navy)
Ex Eastern Sea ended with the four British boats sailing the short distance up to Latvia's capital, Riga (Picture: Royal Navy)
The exercise was one strand of a series of early autumn exercises involving the Joint Expedition Force (Picture: Royal Navy)
The exercise was one strand of a series of early autumn exercises involving the Joint Expeditionary Force (Picture: Royal Navy)
A sailor looks out into the open water through his binoculars (Picture: Royal Navy)
The P2000 crews knuckled down on Exercise Eastern Sea, which ran through a range of likely scenarios (Picture: Royal Navy)
Royal Navy and Latvian personnel talk to each other on the exercise (Picture: Royal Navy)
The sun shimmered on the water as the vessels worked together (Picture: Royal Navy)
Ex Eastern Sea ended with the four British boats sailing the short distance up to Latvia's capital, Riga (Picture: Royal Navy)
The exercise was one strand of a series of early autumn exercises involving the Joint Expedition Force (Picture: Royal Navy)
Navy

In pictures: Royal Navy patrol craft joins Latvian allies to safeguard Baltic waters

Jonathan Moynihan
A sailor looks out into the open water through his binoculars (Picture: Royal Navy)
A sailor looks out into the open water through his binoculars (Picture: Royal Navy)
The P2000 crews knuckled down on Exercise Eastern Sea, which ran through a range of likely scenarios (Picture: Royal Navy)
The P2000 crews knuckled down on Exercise Eastern Sea, which ran through a range of likely scenarios (Picture: Royal Navy)
Royal Navy and Latvian personnel talk to each other on the exercise (Picture: Royal Navy)
Royal Navy and Latvian personnel talk to each other on the exercise (Picture: Royal Navy)
The sun shimmered on the water as the vessels worked together (Picture: Royal Navy)
The sun shimmered on the water as the vessels worked together (Picture: Royal Navy)
Ex Eastern Sea ended with the four British boats sailing the short distance up to Latvia's capital, Riga (Picture: Royal Navy)
Ex Eastern Sea ended with the four British boats sailing the short distance up to Latvia's capital, Riga (Picture: Royal Navy)
The exercise was one strand of a series of early autumn exercises involving the Joint Expedition Force (Picture: Royal Navy)
The exercise was one strand of a series of early autumn exercises involving the Joint Expeditionary Force (Picture: Royal Navy)
A sailor looks out into the open water through his binoculars (Picture: Royal Navy)
The P2000 crews knuckled down on Exercise Eastern Sea, which ran through a range of likely scenarios (Picture: Royal Navy)
Royal Navy and Latvian personnel talk to each other on the exercise (Picture: Royal Navy)
The sun shimmered on the water as the vessels worked together (Picture: Royal Navy)
Ex Eastern Sea ended with the four British boats sailing the short distance up to Latvia's capital, Riga (Picture: Royal Navy)
The exercise was one strand of a series of early autumn exercises involving the Joint Expedition Force (Picture: Royal Navy)

Royal Navy fast patrol boats have churned up the Baltic as they worked with Latvian forces to protect the region at sea.

Four P2000s – HMS Dasher, Express, Puncher, and Pursuer – worked in both the open Baltic and the more sheltered waters of the Gulf of Riga to develop individual and combined skills to safeguard Latvian shores and waters during Exercise Eastern Sea.

The boats from the Portsmouth-based Coastal Forces Squadron worked through a range of likely scenarios, joint manoeuvres and combined drills off the Latvian coast.

The Archer-class vessels have been developing tactics to enhance the Royal Navy's use of small craft near shorelines, including through the use of uncrewed systems.

The Latvian navy and the country's coast guard patrol a coastline which extends for around 500km from the border with Lithuania to Estonia in the Gulf of Riga.

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