Grain ship leaves Ukraine port for first time since Russia blockade

A ship carrying Ukrainian grain has left the port of Odesa for the first time since the start of the Russian invasion under an internationally brokered deal to unblock Ukraine’s agricultural exports and ease a growing global food crisis.

The Sierra Leone-flagged ship Razoni, carrying 26,000 tonnes of corn, finally set sail for Lebanon on Monday morning, according to Ukraine’s infrastructure ministry, following weeks of negotiations between Ukraine and Russia, led by Turkey and the United Nations.

The Russian blockade of Ukraine’s ports since the start of the war in February has stoked a worldwide grain shortage that has caused the UN to warn of a looming hunger catastrophe.

“Ukraine, together with our partners, has taken another step today in preventing world hunger,” said Oleksandr Kubrakov, Ukraine’s infrastructure minister. He stressed that Ukraine had done “everything” to restore the ports and said the lifting of the blockade would give Ukraine’s economy $1bn (£820m) in foreign exchange revenue.

The Kremlin said the news of the departure was “very positive” and Turkey’s defence ministry said more ships would follow. Kubrakov said 16 loaded vessels had been stuck in Ukraine’s ports since the Russian invasion began and that officials planned for the ports to regain full transport capacity in the coming weeks.

Fighting meanwhile continued across Ukraine’s frontlines, according to Ukraine’s general staff, as four additional US-supplied Himar long-range rocket systems as well as a third German Mars II, another long-range rocket system, arrived in Ukraine.

The mayor of Mykolaiv, Oleksandr Syenkevych, said Sunday’s shelling of the city, which has been hit almost every day since the war began, had been the heaviest yet. Among the dead was an agro-tycoon and one of Ukraine’s richest men, Oleksiy Vadaturskyi. One man was also killed and another injured in shelling early on Monday in Kharkiv, which continues to be shelled regularly.

In the Donetsk region, Pavlo Kyrylenko, the head of the regional military administration, said on Monday that three people were killed and 16 injured as a result of fighting on Sunday. Ukraine’s authorities have called for all residents in areas of Ukrainian-controlled Donbas, which has no stable gas or electricity supply, to evacuate and its minister for the temporarily occupied territories, Iryna Vereshchuk, said they planned to evacuate about 50,000 children and 200,000 adults. Those who choose to stay, said Vereshchuk, will be asked to sign a form acknowledging their decision.

Russia’s blockade of Ukraine, one of the world’s biggest grain producers, has caused a worldwide grain shortage and price rises, which pushed some countries that are reliant on grain imports, mainly in the Middle East and Africa, towards famine. About 20m tonnes of grain is reportedly stuck in the country waiting to be exported.

Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, described the departure of the grain shipment as a “day of relief for the world” and Turkey’s foreign minister, Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, tweeted that he hoped exports from Ukraine would continue without interruptions and problems.

“We’ll do what is necessary to this end. We hope that the agreement will lead to a ceasefire and lasting peace,” he said.

The UN’s joint coordination centre, set up to facilitate the deal, said it authorised the ship to leave the port and that it would be monitoring the vessel as it sailed through the agreed path.

But the world is watching to see if Russia sticks to its side of the bargain, after an attack on the port of Odesa a week ago.

The UK foreign secretary, Liz Truss, who is leading the race to become Britain’s next prime minister, described the shipment as an important first step and accused Russia of weaponising global food supplies. She said in a statement that the “only way [Vladimir] Putin can alleviate the global food security crisis is by ending his brutal invasion of Ukraine”.

“There’s room for cautious optimism today but implementation is still fraught with risks,” said Timothy Ash, senior sovereign strategist at Bluebay Asset Management and associate fellow at Chatham House. “I think we need to remember it is still a very active war zone; it only takes one stray missile for shipments to stall.”

In the deal, signed on 22 July in Istanbul, Russia agreed to allow grain ships to leave Ukraine and to not attack them, or Ukraine’s ports, while the shipments were in transit. Less than 24 hours later, the veracity of the deal was cast into doubt when Russian forces struck the port of Odesa.

When questioned by Turkey’s defence minister, Russia at first denied it was involved in the attack. But the next day it issued a statement saying it had struck a Ukrainian vessel that was in the port and carrying western weapons. Ukraine’s authorities rejected Russia’s explanation.

Since the blockade, Ukraine has managed to export more than 4m tonnes of grain through the Danube River and its railways, but work is needed to reach the prewar export levels of 6m to 8m tonnes a month, say experts.

Industry experts have said finding insurers and crews ready to take the risk will be a major obstacle for exports now and in the future.

On Friday, the Lloyd’s of London insurer Ascot and the broker Marsh announced they had launched marine cargo and war insurance for grain and food products moving from the Black Sea ports.

The British ambassador to Ukraine, Melinda Simmons, said that while the UK was not involved in the deal, it had helped in securing commercial insurance for the ships from providers in London. The announcement from Ascot signalled that progress had been made.

Simmons said the port attack had worried insurance companies, but she insisted they should not be deterred. “The main thing is not to be scared of Russia’s tactics because that’s what they are – tactics, to stop this from happening,” she said.