Kyiv hopes Russia will within days resume its participation in an agreement that allowed shipments of Ukrainian grain through the Black Sea to help alleviate a global food crisis.
Talks between the UN, Turkey and Russia on Moscow’s return to the so-called Black Sea grain initiative are continuing following Moscow’s withdrawal from the deal last Saturday. “We expect to receive an answer within a few days, maximum,” Yuriy Vaskov, Ukraine’s deputy infrastructure minister, said in an interview.
The agreement was brokered in July by the UN and Ankara to end Russia’s blockade of Ukraine’s ports following Moscow’s full-scale invasion of its neighbour in February. Since then more than 9mn tonnes of grain have passed through Ukraine’s Black Sea ports despite the war.