![]() But the UN secretary-general António Guterres said more work was needed before a deal was signed. He said Ankara will ensure the safety of shipments in transit and the parties will jointly check grain cargoes in ports. Turkey’s defence minister Hulusi Akar said an agreement would be signed next week. The Istanbul negotiations – the first face-to-face talks between Russian and Ukrainian delegations since 29 March – are being complicated by growing suspicions that Russia is trying to export grain it has stolen from Ukrainian farmers in regions under its control. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine shows no signs of abating and the sides remain locked in a furious long-range shooting battle that is destroying towns and leaving people with nothing. Russia and Ukraine met UN and Turkish officials on Wednesday in an attempt to break the months-long impasse over grain exports. Owing to Russia’s blockade of Black Sea ports and a plethora of mines along the coast, 20m to 25m tons of wheat are stuck in Ukraine, pushing up world grain prices. ![]() It also accounts for 42% of the sunflower oil market and 16% of world corn production. ![]() Ukraine is the world’s leading wheat exporter, accounting for 9% of the global market. In June Ukraine exported about 2.5m metric tons of goods, far short of the 8m metric tons it had hoped to export, the infrastructure ministry said. The capacity of the new routes is “currently insufficient to replace seaports fully”, Ukrainian officials noted. Ukrainian officials hope that the new route for grain exports will allow an additional 500,000 tons to be exported, although that will still be far short of the amount of grain that was exported before the Russian invasion. ![]() “Given the liberation of Zmiinyi Island from Russian troops and the buildup of a large number of ships waiting to proceed through the Sulina canal, it is possible to use the channel of the Bystry estuary of the Danube-Black Sea waterway for the entry/exit of ships transporting agricultural produce,” the Administration of Sea Ports of Ukraine said in a statement at the weekend. ![]() Until recently, the Bystre estuary route had been closed, but that has changed with the removal of Russian forces from Snake Island. ![]()
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