Ukraine-NATO Council strongly condemns Russia’s withdrawal from Grain Agreement

The Ukraine-NATO Council strongly condemned Russia's decision to withdraw from the Black Sea Grain Agreement during a meeting on Wednesday.

This is stated in the NATO statement.

"Allies and Ukraine strongly condemned Russia's decision to withdraw from the Black Sea grain deal and its deliberate attempts to stop Ukraine's agricultural exports on which hundreds of millions of people worldwide depend. They also condemned Russia's recent missile attacks on Odesa, Mykolaiv, and other port cities, including Moscow's cynical drone attack on the Ukrainian grain storage facility in the Danube port city of Reni, very close to the Romanian border," the message reads.

It is noted that the members of the Alliance noted that Russia's new warning zone in the Black Sea, within the exclusive economic zone of Bulgaria, created new risks, as well as serious obstacles to freedom of navigation.

It is also indicated that NATO and the members of the Alliance are strengthening surveillance and intelligence in the Black Sea region, in particular with the help of maritime patrol aircraft and drones.

For reference:

The Black Sea Grain Agreement was signed in July 2022. Putin has repeatedly threatened not to extend the agreement, demanding the lifting of sanctions and obstacles to Russian exports.

Moscow's main demand was to restore Rosselkhozbank's access to the SWIFT interbank network, from which the EU expelled Russia in June 2022 for the invasion of Ukraine.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres sent a letter to Putin in which he proposed to extend the agreement for several months to give the EU time to connect the Russian bank to SWIFT.

The cost of wheat rose 3% to $6.80 a bushel following the Russian government's announcement that it is terminating the Black Sea grain deal with Ukraine.

As reported, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, at Kyiv's request, convened a meeting of the newly created Ukraine-NATO Council on July 26 for consultations on Russia's latest actions and discussion of the transportation of Ukrainian grain across the Black Sea.