The Russians are concerned with getting the Black Sea ports either under control or destroying them.


Russian shelling destroyed the warehouses of one of Ukraine’s largest agricultural commodities terminals in the Black Sea port of Mykolaiv over the weekend, authorities and the facility’s owner and authorities said on Tuesday.

The attack came at a time Turkey is trying to develop a U.N.-backed plan to start grain exports from Ukraine’s ports, and ahead of meetings on Wednesday by the foreign ministers of Russian and Turkey to discuss safe shipping.

The day before yesterday, the warehouses of one of the largest terminals in Ukraine were destroyed, Mr. Vitaliy Kim, the governor of the Mykolaiv region, told Ukrainian television.

Mr. Kim did not name the terminal, but Ukrainian conglomerate Group DF identified the target as its Nika-Tera port facility in Mykolaiv.

The port complex Nika-Tera has come under massive shelling, Mr. Lanny J. Davis, U.S. co-counsel to Group DF owner Dmytro Firtash said in a statement on Tuesday.

It said the attack rendered the port facilities entirely unusable.


Food Prices Soared After Putin's Attacks

Reports of attacks in Mykolaiv helped drive wheat prices up more than 5 per cent on Monday, and dampened expectations that a diplomatic deal could be reached to resume sea shipments of Ukrainian grain.

Mr. Taras Vysotskyi, Ukraine’s first deputy minister of Agrarian Policy and Food, said on Tuesday that Ukraine would only be able to export a maximum 2 million tonnes of grains a month if Russia refuses to lift its blockade of the country’s Black Sea ports.

Before the war, Ukraine was able to export 6 million tonnes of grains a month. Currently, more than 20 million tonnes of grain are stuck in the country’s silos.