Russia and Ukraine signed a landmark deal on Friday to reopen Ukrainian Black Sea ports for grain exports, raising hopes that an international food crisis can be eased.
The accord crowned two months of talks brokered by the United Nations and Turkey aimed at what UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres called a "package" that would both restore Ukrainian grain exports while easing Russian grain and fertilizer shipments despite tough Western sanctions on Moscow.
Guterres said the accord opens the way to significant volumes of commercial food exports from three key Ukrainian ports – Odesa, Chernomorsk and Yuzhny, and the UN would set up a coordination centre to monitor implementation of the deal.
"Today, there is a beacon on the Black Sea. A beacon of hope..., possibility...and relief in a world that needs it more than ever," Guterres told the gathering.
But fighting raged on unabated in Ukraine's east and, underlining deep-seated enmity and mistrust driving the worst conflict in Europe since World War Two, Russian and Ukrainian representatives declined to sit at the same table at the ceremony, and the display of the two countries' flags was adjusted so that they were no longer next to one other.
"In case of provocations, (there will be) an immediate military response" by Ukraine, Kyiv presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak tweeted before the ceremony.
Russia and Ukraine, both among the world's top exporters of food, sent their defence and infrastructure ministers respectively to Istanbul for the signing ceremony, also attended by Guterres and Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan.
A blockade of Ukrainian ports by Russia's Black Sea fleet, trapping tens of millions of tonnes of grain in silos and stranding many ships, has worsened global supply chain bottlenecks and, along with sweeping Western sanctions, stoked galloping inflation in food and energy prices around the world.
Moscow has denied responsibility for the worsening food crisis, blaming instead Western sanctions for slowing its own food and fertilizer exports and Ukraine for mining the approaches to its Black Sea ports.
Senior UN officials, briefing reporters on Friday, said the deal was expected to be fully operational in a few weeks.
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