Ship-owning companies have informed Ukraine about their readiness to continue grain exports from Ukrainian ports, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in an interview with journalists from African countries on Monday.
“Even without Russia, everything must be done so that we can use this “Black Sea Corridor”. We are not afraid. Companies that own ships have approached us. They said that they are ready if Ukraine [kuģus] will miss, but Turkey will let through. Everyone is ready to continue grain deliveries,” the president said.
As part of the “Grain Initiative”, two separate agreements were concluded, however, none of them contain direct agreements between Ukraine and Russia, Zelenskiy reminded.
“We had two agreements. The first – Ukraine, Turkey, UN. The second – Russia, Turkey, UN. So when Russia says it is leaving [“labības vienošanos”]it terminates its engagement with the UN Secretary-General [Antoniu] Guterres and the President of Turkey [Redžepu Tajipu] Erdogan. Not with us. We had no agreements with them,” said Zelensky.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine has been given the task of preparing official signals to the UN and Turkey so that they answer for their readiness to continue the Black Sea “grain initiative”, the President of Ukraine stated.
Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov announced on Monday that Russia is withdrawing from the international agreement that allowed the export of grain from Ukraine via the Black Sea.
The term of the agreement, which has been extended several times, expires today.
“Grain deal” negotiations have actually been terminated, it has been suspended, Peskov announced.
It is true, he added, that “Russia will return to the “grain deal” without delay, as soon as the agreements related to it are fulfilled.”
On Monday, Russia informed Turkey and Ukraine, as well as the UN Secretariat, about their objections to the extension of the “grain deal”, the press secretary of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Maria Zakharova told the Russian propaganda media “RIA Novosti”.
Erdogan, on the other hand, expressed confidence on Monday that Russian President Vladimir Putin still wants to extend the international “grain deal”, which guarantees the export of Ukrainian grain through the Black Sea.
“I believe that Russian President Putin wants the work of this humanitarian bridge to continue, despite [Krievijas] for today’s announcement,” Erdogan told reporters in Istanbul, referring to the Black Sea “grain corridor” agreement.
As Erdogan said, he will have talks with Putin even before the Russian leader’s visit to Turkey in August.
An agreement to extend the “grain deal” “without interruption” could be reached even before Putin’s visit in August, Erdogan said, adding that talks to that end were already underway.
Ukraine and Russia, through Turkey, signed an agreement with the UN on July 22 of last year on the resumption of the export of Ukrainian agricultural goods to the Black Sea, which was interrupted when Russia began its repeated invasion of Ukraine on February 24.
The agreement has allowed Ukraine to ship more than 32 million tons of grain past Russian warships in the Black Sea. Much of this grain ended up in developing countries in Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere. If exports were to be blocked again, food prices could rise even further.
According to media reports, the European Union is considering concessions to the Russian bank for the “grain deal”. It is about the creation of a subsidiary of the sanctioned bank “Rosseļhozbank” in order to restore its links with the international payment notification system SWIFT, Ukrainian web media “Ukrainska Pravda” reports.
Russia has also explained its objections to the extension of the agreement by the fact that obstacles are being placed on the export of its agricultural products and mineral fertilizers.
2023-07-17 17:09:20
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