Ukraine Proposes Black Sea Ship Truce to Reopen 90% Grain Export Route
Updated
Updated · The Guardian · Aug 13
Ukraine Proposes Black Sea Ship Truce to Reopen 90% Grain Export Route
3 articles · Updated · The Guardian · Aug 13
Summary
Kyiv has offered Russia, via a third party, a mutual halt to attacks on civilian ships in the Black Sea to revive a grain corridor that is now largely frozen.
90% of Ukraine’s grain and sunflower exports normally leave through Odesa, Chornomorsk and Pivdenne, but Russia’s intensified strikes on southern ports and Ukraine’s own campaign against Russian shipping have choked traffic.
Since July, Ukrainian drones have hit nearly 220 vessels in the Sea of Azov and Black Sea, effectively shutting commercial Russian shipping on the route and forcing Russia to suspend traffic through a canal linking the Caspian to the Azov.
The proposal follows reported U.S. pressure: JD Vance allegedly urged Volodymyr Zelenskyy on July 31 to stop strikes on tankers carrying Kazakh oil, though Ukraine has kept hitting other targets in Novorossiysk.
The move echoes the UN- and Turkey-backed Black Sea grain initiative that ran from July 2022 to July 2023 before Russia quit, again putting food exports and maritime security at the center of the war.