Ukraine announced on Saturday that two cargo ships were currently sailing in the Black Sea towards its ports, a first since the end in July of the grain agreement with Russia which has allowed the export of Ukrainian goods since the summer of 2022 despite the Russian invasion.
“The first civilian ships are using the temporary corridor to reach Ukrainian ports,” Ukrainian Infrastructure Minister Oleksandr Koubrakov said on Facebook.
“The cargo ships “Resilient Africa” and “Aroyat” confirmed that they were ready to take the route to the port of Chornomorsk to load almost 20,000 tonnes of wheat destined for Africa and Asia,” he said. he added in his press release.
According to the information he published, the two cargo ships “fly the flag of Palau and their crew is made up of citizens of Turkey, Azerbaijan, Egypt and Ukraine”.
Threats from Moscow
These are the first ships to sail towards ports in southern Ukraine since mid-July, despite Moscow’s repeated threat to target its boats.
In mid-July, Russia had in fact slammed the door on the cereal agreement signed in the summer of 2022 with Kiev under the aegis of the UN and Turkey to allow, despite the war, the export of Ukrainian cereals. , crucial for global food security.
Since then, Russia has carried out a bombing campaign targeting Ukraine’s port and grain infrastructure, a means, according to kyiv, of preventing any attempt at exports. Moscow, for its part, claims to have hit military targets.
“In one month”, “270,000 tonnes of grain” had been destroyed in Russian strikes, Mr. Koubrakov indicated on August 23.
At this stage, in the opposite direction – towards the Bosphorus Strait – “five cargo ships took the temporary corridor” set up by kyiv, the minister recalled on Saturday.