Turkey and the UN are preparing new talks on a ceasefire in the Black Sea — media
Kyiv • UNN
The talks involving Turkey, the UN and mediators are scheduled for early October. The initiative is intended to protect grain shipments and ports.
Turkey and the UN have initiated new talks with Russia and Ukraine on a ceasefire in the Black Sea, seeking to bring together fragmented efforts to protect grain supplies amid a sharp rise in global food prices, UNN reports, citing Bloomberg.
According to a senior diplomat, the meetings will take place in early October. Representatives of the Swiss nongovernmental organization Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue will act as mediators, added the diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The publication notes that this initiative, launched in September with the support of other world powers, aims to replicate the success of the 2022 efforts to ensure the safety of grain shipments through the Black Sea. After that agreement expired a year later, the countries struggled to coordinate joint action on a ceasefire.
The talks are gaining momentum as Russia and Ukraine — which together account for more than a quarter of global wheat exports — intensify mutual attacks on port facilities in the Black Sea, leading to a rise in wheat futures prices to a three-year high in August. These attacks are heightening concerns about food supplies, as yields in other regions are suffering from unfavorable weather conditions, the El Niño phenomenon is intensifying, and prices remain at multiyear peak levels.
The involvement of Turkey and the UN lends weight to the initiative, as they were responsible for implementing the 2022 ceasefire agreement, which guaranteed the safe transportation of grain, fertilizers, and food products from Ukrainian ports. This agreement became one of the few instances in which a limited truce held for a period of time during more than four years of Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine.
At the end of September, during the session of the UN General Assembly, a closed-door meeting was held to launch this diplomatic initiative. Officials from Turkey participated, along with representatives of the United States, European countries, India, and Egypt (the latter having been particularly severely affected by disruptions in grain supplies).
The participants discussed a "clearly defined and reciprocal agreement" providing for free commercial shipping and the protection of ports and energy infrastructure, according to a document seen by Bloomberg. Wheat prices also declined somewhat in September.
The upcoming talks will focus primarily on the problems of countries affected by rising food prices; there is hope that their distance from the immediate conflict will contribute to the success of the initiative.
A spokesperson for the Turkish government did not respond to a request for comment. Earlier in September, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he had received a "positive" response from Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy regarding the resumption of the Black Sea "grain corridor." However, Ukraine’s Minister of Agrarian Policy Taras Vysotskyi recently told Bloomberg News that he saw no positive signs that this could happen in the coming months.
Let us recall
The prospects for reaching an agreement currently appear bleak because of Russia’s position: dictator Vladimir Putin rejected proposals for a mutual cessation of strikes between Russia and Ukraine in the Black Sea. Proposals to halt attacks on Russian oil refineries in exchange for Moscow refraining from strikes on Ukrainian vessels are unequal, as Russian diesel fuel remains under sanctions, he said on Thursday during a meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in September that returning to the 2022 Black Sea agreement was "absolutely unacceptable and unrealistic," claiming that Ukraine had abused the terms of the arrangement.