Russia boycotts grain exports from Ukraine, blocking ships for weeks

Ships that export Ukrainian grain spend three to four weeks waiting in the Black Sea.

The reason for this, according to the Ukrainian government, is the unjustified requirements imposed by Russian inspectors.

Since last July, about 1,700 merchant ships have been able to call at Ukrainian ports based on the four-way agreement signed by Russia, Ukraine, Turkey and the United Nations, the latter two as mediators.

Teams of inspectors from the four actors involved in the so-called Black Sea Grain Initiative must monitor whether there is any cargo other than grain on the ships.

Sources close to the supervision process of a ship heading to Spain have detailed to EL PAÍS how the Moscow blockade works.

Russian warships have closed maritime access to Ukraine since the invasion began in February 2022. The global food crisis caused by this isolation—Ukraine is one of the world's five largest grain producers—forced the Russian president , Vladimir Putin, to accept an agreement for the export of grain.

Spain is the second destination for Ukrainian grain after China: according to UN data, of the more than 27 million tons exported since July, 6.2 million have gone to China and 4.7 million to Spain.

As sources from the European Commission explained to this newspaper last November, most of what arrives in Spain is re-exported to third countries.

The

It is a bulk carrier of 210 meters in length.

She sails under the Panamanian flag and, according to the latest available public records, is owned by a Japanese shipping company.

On March 8, already in Turkish waters, he headed for Istanbul to receive the go-ahead from the inspectors of the Joint Coordination Center (JCC), the body that manages the grain corridor between Russia, Ukraine, Turkey and the UN.

Her navigation was to continue through the Black Sea to the Ukrainian port of Yuzhne, where she would load 65,000 tons of wheat.

After that, her return to Turkey was scheduled, where she can pass a new inspection process.

The route was to continue towards the Mediterranean with the port of Tarragona as the final destination.

.

The

had to wait until March 30 (22 days) to receive the JCC inspectors.

The Ukrainian Infrastructure and Foreign Ministries issued a statement on February 22 in which they denounced that since last November, the Russian side was expressly delaying by half the rate of 10 agreed daily inspections.

Andrei Stavnitser, president of the Neptune grain terminal, in the port of Yuzhne (Odesa), assures that the situation is worse because of these 10 daily ships, only one or two are managing to overcome the blockade.

Irina Kosse is an academic who regularly monitors shipping traffic in the Black Sea for the Institute for Economic Research of Ukraine.

By her latest count, only three ships pass inspections daily.

last February

that since last fall, the average waiting time has risen from a week to a month.

In that February statement, kyiv claimed that there were 140 merchantmen waiting in Turkish waters to continue their journey.

Executive sources assured the Reuters agency on the 2nd that the queue at that time was 94 vessels.

EL PAÍS has reconstructed from two sources involved in the supervision process how the

inspection was developed .

The first setback is that Russian inspectors—military with no knowledge of shipping, according to these sources—only work five hours a day, unlike inspectors from the other parties involved.

The agents who appeared at the

They demanded that the water ballast used to stabilize the ship be emptied, on the pretext that weapons could be hidden in the tank.

Using this ballast is common practice on merchant ships.

Both the captain of the ship and the Ukrainian, Turkish and UN inspectors stressed that this operation was not necessary because it is practically impossible for the tanks to store anything other than water.

The Russians did not give up their efforts and the captain ordered the ballast emptying process, which lasted six hours, thus losing a working day of inspection.

Correct misspellings

On March 31, after confirming that the ballast tank contained nothing but water, Russian inspectors spent two hours reading the

stressing that there were misspellings.

Stavnitser explains that the main way to delay inspections by Russia is forcing them to rewrite all possible documentation of the merchantmen, emphasizing typing or spelling mistakes.

After that, the Russian entourage began an exhaustive examination of the

, even demanding that compartments be opened that had not been used for years and that were clogged due to disuse, as this newspaper has been able to verify with a video sent from the ship.

Some of the gates had to be broken to satisfy the request of the Russian inspectors, according to testimony from the process.

The

was able to set course for Ukrainian waters on the afternoon of March 31.

A trip that can be done in less than 48 hours, took three weeks.

The merchantman finally entered the port of Yuzhne on the afternoon of April 3, where she was docked until the 6th. This Monday she was back in the waters of Istanbul.

Neither on the

nor on any other of the 1,700 ships that have participated in the transport of grain have cargoes other than those established in the agreement been found.

Moscow has acknowledged on several occasions that the waiting time for the boats had increased, although it affirms that the problem is one of Ukrainian management.

Irina Kosse explains that after multiple conversations with ship captains and other agents of the sector involved, she has no doubt that those responsible for the delays are the Russian inspectors.

Ella Kosse adds that, despite this, she has not identified a reduction in the monthly tons exported because the companies are using merchant vessels with more cargo capacity.

Last March the agreement for the transport of the grain was extended for four months, although the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, accused Kiev's Western allies of wanting to boycott it because they were not doing enough to lift sanctions on fertilizer exports. russians.

Last November, when Russia threatened to suspend the agreement, Lavrov pointed out that there were delays in the access of ships heading to Ukraine because his government was dissatisfied with the pace of lifting sanctions against its agricultural and fertilizer exports - something confirmed by the UN Secretary General, António Guterres.

"The Hunger Games"

Peter Stano, spokesman for the European Commission for Foreign Affairs, says that "it is important that Russia fully commit to the grain deal and speed up inspections."

Stano describes the Russian strategy as "hunger games": "It is important to remember why the grain agreement in the Black Sea has been necessary, due to the Russian Army's blockade of exports from Ukraine."

"If Russia is truly committed to easing the [food price] situation around the world and in Africa in particular," says the EU spokesperson, "it should remove illegal military restrictions against Ukrainian agricultural exports." .

The Ukrainian government denounces that while the capacity of international access to its cereals is drastically reduced, Russia has already been able to export 250 million tons of products from its Black Sea ports and from the occupied territories in Ukraine.

Of these, 35 million tons are grain, according to Stavnitser: “While Russian ships move freely around the world, our grain rots in warehouses.

The rules of the game must be the same, or at least fair, because for now Ukraine is forced to lose the economic war”.

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