Russia disrupted work of “grain corridor” on April 11

On Tuesday, April 11, the “grain corridor” was suspended due to the absence of inspections by the Joint Coordination Center (JCC), and Ukraine blames the situation on Russian sabotage.

According to the JCC on its website, the last four inspections took place the day before, on April 10, on vessels that left the port of Odesa and Chornomorsk on March 31-April 1.

The list of vessels that did not pass the inspection on the JCC website includes 31 vessels with departure dates from April 1 to April 11, including two that left Ukrainian ports on Tuesday and three more the day before.

In a comment to The Guardian, Deputy Head of the Ministry of Reconstruction Yuriy Vaskov confirmed that no inspections were conducted on April 11. According to him, the Ukrainian side handed over the names of three grain carriers, but representatives of the Russian side in the JCC crossed out the names and gave other vessels. As a result, none of the vessels were allowed to continue moving, Vaskov said.

“Today we have a critical situation. The Russians have violated the terms of the Black Sea Grain Initiative. They decided to unilaterally change the plans of Ukrainian ports. This is unacceptable,” The Guardian quoted the Deputy Minister as saying.

Earlier, the Ukrainian Confederation of Agrarian Business reported that during the 36th week of the “grain corridor”, from April 3 to April 9, 2023, 655.9 thousand tons of agricultural products were exported through the seaports of Odesa region, which is 23% less than the shipments through this channel a week earlier.