By Pavel Polityuk
KYIV (Reuters) -Ukraine’s president and United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on Wednesday for the extension of a deal with Moscow that has allowed Kyiv to export grain via Black Sea ports during Russia’s invasion.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said after talks with Guterres in Kyiv that the Black Sea Grain Initiative was necessary for the world, and the U.N. chief underlined the importance of the deal to global food security and food prices.
The 120-day deal, initially brokered by the United Nations and Turkey last July and extended in November, will be renewed on March 18 if no party objects.
“I want to underscore the critical importance of rolling over the Black Sea Grain Initiative on 18 March and working to create the conditions to enable the greatest possible use of export infrastructure through the Black Sea in line with the objectives of the initiative,” Guterres told reporters.
Zelenskiy said he and Guterres had agreed that rolling over the deal on March 18 was “critically necessary for the world.”
Russia, which lifted a blockade of three Ukrainian Black Sea ports under the deal, has signalled that obstacles to its own agricultural exports need to be removed before it lets the deal continue.
To help convince Russia to allow Ukraine to resume Black Sea grain exports, a three-year deal was also struck last year in which the United Nations agreed to help facilitate Russian food and fertilizer exports.
Ukraine and Russia are both major global suppliers of grains and fertilizers.
Western powers have hit Russia with tough sanctions over its invasion of neighbouring Ukraine more than one year ago. While Russia’s food and fertilizer exports are not subject to sanctions, Moscow says restrictions on its payments, logistics and insurance industries are a “barrier” to such shipments.
(Reporting by Pavel Polityuk, Editing by Timothy Heritage)
