UN, Ukraine, and Turkey agree not to plan movement of ships across humanitarian corridor in Black Sea for 2 November

The UN Representative Office in the Joint Coordination Centre says that no vessel will pass across the humanitarian corridor in the Black Sea on 2 November, Russia’s state news agency TASS reports.

“Delegations from Ukraine, Turkey, and the UN in the Joint Coordination Centre agreed not to plan any vessel movement within the framework of the Black Sea Grain Initiative for 2 November,” the statement says. 

The UN emphasised that interrupting vessel traffic was a temporary measure. 

Representatives of Russia, Ukraine, Turkey, and the UN signed an agreement regarding the exports of Ukraine’s grain via the Black Sea on 22 July. The sides agreed to create a safe naval corridor for commercial vessels to sail across from Ukrainian ports Odesa, Chornomorsk, and Yuzhne. On 29 October, Russia withdrew from the “grain deal”, blaming the “massive strike” via drones on ships and infrastructure of the Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol. 

On 24 October, Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that Russia had asked the United Nations for data on the destinations of grain shipments as it was “not certain about the end recipient”. Russian President Vladimir Putin said that further use of the humanitarian corridors for grain export from Ukraine would be called into question if it turned out that they were being used for “terrorist attacks”.

Despite that, Ukraine, Turkey, and the UN agreed on a 31 October movement plan for 16 vessels that would sail across the humanitarian corridor. They informed Russia of that decision. Later, Russia’s Ministry of Defence announced that Russia was suspending ship traffic across the “grain corridor”.