Ukraine says Russian missiles hit port

Natalia Zinets | July 24, 2022

Russian missiles have hit Ukraine’s southern port of Odesa, the Ukrainian military says, threatening a deal signed a day earlier to unblock grain exports from Black Sea ports and ease global food shortages caused by the war.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Saturday called the strike blatant “barbarism” showing Moscow could not be trusted to implement the deal.

However, public broadcaster Suspilne quoted the Ukrainian military as saying the missiles had not caused significant damage and a government minister said preparations continued to restart grain exports from Black Sea ports.

The deal signed on Friday by Moscow and Kyiv and mediated by the United Nations and Turkey was hailed as a breakthrough after nearly five months of punishing fighting since Russia invaded its neighbour. It is seen as crucial to curbing soaring global food prices by allowing grain exports to be shipped from Black Sea ports including Odesa.

The strikes on Odesa drew strong condemnation from the United Nations, the European Union, the United States, Britain, Germany and Italy. On Friday, UN officials said they hoped the agreement would be operational in a few weeks.

Turkey’s defence minister said Russian officials told Ankara that Moscow had “nothing to do” with the strikes on Odesa. Neither Russian defence ministry statements nor the military’s evening summary mentioned any missile strike in Odesa. The ministry did not reply to a Reuters request for comment.

Two Russian Kalibr missiles hit the area of a pumping station at the port, while two others were shot down by air defence forces, according to Ukraine’s military. Ukrainian air force spokesman Yuriy Ignat said the missiles were fired from warships in the Black Sea near Crimea.

Suspilne quoted Ukraine’s southern military command as saying the port’s grain storage area was not hit.

The strike appeared to violate the terms of Friday’s deal, which would allow safe passage in and out of Ukrainian ports.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement that “this attack casts serious doubt on the credibility of Russia’s commitment to yesterday’s deal.”

“Russia bears responsibility for deepening the global food crisis and must stop its aggression,” he added.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres “unequivocally condemned” the strikes, a spokesperson said, adding that full implementation of the deal was imperative.

Turkish Defence Minister Hulusai Akar said in a statement: “The Russians told us that they had absolutely nothing to do with this attack … The fact that such an incident took place right after the agreement we made yesterday really worried us.”

Ukraine has mined waters near its ports as part of its war defences, but under the deal pilots will guide ships along safe channels.

Moscow has denied responsibility for the food crisis, blaming Western sanctions for slowing its food and fertiliser exports and Ukraine for mining the approaches to its ports.

A blockade of Ukrainian ports by Russia’s Black Sea fleet since Moscow’s February 24 invasion has trapped tens of millions of tonnes of grain and stranded many ships.

This has worsened global supply chain bottlenecks. Along with Western sanctions on Russia, it has stoked food and energy price inflation. Russia and Ukraine are major global wheat suppliers and a global food crisis has pushed some 47 million people into “acute hunger,” according to the World Food Program.

The deal would restore grain shipments from the three reopened ports to pre-war levels of five million tonnes a month, UN officials said.

Zelenskiy said it would make around $US10 billion ($A14 billion) worth of grain available for sale with roughly 20 million tonnes of last year’s harvest to be exported.

Also on Saturday, the US State Department confirmed that two Americans were killed recently in Ukraine’s Donbas region but declined to provide details.

Three people were killed when 13 Russian missiles hit a military airfield and railway infrastructure in Ukraine’s central region of Kirovohrad, the regional governor said.