Russia offers free passage for Ukraine's stuck grain shipments

UNITED NATIONS • Russia has offered "safe passage" for Ukrainian grain shipments from the country's Black Sea ports, but said it is not responsible for establishing the corridors, as Turkey suggested that ships could be guided around sea mines.

Ukrainian grain shipments have stalled since Russia's invasion and blockade of ports, sparking global price increases for grains, cooking oils, fuel and fertiliser.

The United Nations is trying to broker a deal to resume Ukrainian grain exports and Russian food and fertiliser exports, which Moscow says are harmed by sanctions.

"We are not responsible for establishing safe corridors. We said we could provide safe passage if these corridors are established," Russia's UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said. "It's obvious. It's either de-mine the territory, which was mined by the Ukrainians, or ensure that the passage goes around those mines," he told reporters at the UN.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu earlier on Wednesday said it would "take some time" to de-mine Ukraine's ports but a safe sea corridor could be established in areas without mines under a UN proposal, adding that Ankara was still awaiting Moscow's reaction to the plan.

"Since the location of the mines is known, certain safe lines would be established at three ports," Mr Cavusoglu said. "These (commercial) ships, with the guidance of Ukraine's research and rescue vessels as envisaged in the plan, could thus come and go safely to ports without a need to clear the mines."

Meanwhile, the food security crisis stoked by the Ukraine war is set to push more people to flee their homes in poorer countries, driving record levels of global displacement even higher, the head of the UN refugee agency said.

A report by the UN body yesterday showed that some 89.3 million people were forcibly displaced worldwide at the end of last year as a result of persecution, conflict, abuse and violence.

Since then, millions more have fled Ukraine or been displaced within its borders, with price hikes linked to blocked grain exports set to stoke more displacement elsewhere.

"If you have a food crisis on top of everything I have described - war, human rights, climate - it will just accelerate the trends I've described in this report," Mr Filippo Grandi told journalists, describing the figures as "staggering".

He added: "Clearly the impact if this is not resolved quickly will be pretty devastating."

REUTERS