“Yesterday, not a single vessel was able to enter our port. They attacked all the ships. They will intensify this.” That was President Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday, standing beside Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin in Kyiv, describing what he called a Russian push to shut down Ukraine’s grain corridor.
“They will do everything to block our grain corridor,” he said. Kyiv saw the strategy coming months ago, he added, and put a dedicated official in charge of protecting and running the maritime export route.
Shipping lines pull back
Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha had said a day earlier that “zero vessels” moved through the corridor on July 22, at the peak of the grain harvest. He called that a threat to global food security.
Carriers are responding. Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd both said they were stopping calls at the port of Chornomorsk after a jump in Russian missile and drone attacks around Odesa. “Recent missile and drone attacks in the Odesa region have significantly increased the operational and security risks,” Hapag-Lloyd told AFP.
The effects are reaching markets. Lloyd’s List Intelligence, a maritime intelligence firm, said the deteriorating security picture has pushed wheat prices higher as shipowners reconsider the risk of working in Ukrainian waters.
What is at stake
Farm exports are among the few large sources of hard currency Ukraine has left during the full-scale invasion. Around 90% of grain and vegetable oil shipments leave through Black Sea ports near Odesa. Between them, Ukraine and Russia supply roughly 30% of global wheat exports.
Russia has hit Odesa’s ports repeatedly since the war began. Lately it has focused on grain terminals, sunflower oil facilities and commercial vessels. Last Sunday, a Russian attack on a cargo ship off the Odesa coast killed 10 people, four of them Indian nationals.
Ukraine is also hitting back at Russian shipping. Its forces have stepped up attacks on vessels in the Sea of Azov and on Moscow’s “shadow fleet” of oil tankers, which Russia uses to get around Western sanctions.
