The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia "sees no reason" to extend the "grain agreement", which expires on July 17. The Russian side claims that it is "making the necessary efforts" so that the ships involved in the agreement with food could leave the Black Sea via the Bosphorus by this date.
At the beginning of July, Ukraine accused Russia of another disruption and creating a queue in the Bosphorus — the Russian Federation completely stopped the registration of the incoming fleet, blocking 29 ships with 1.4 million tons of food, mainly for Asian and African countries. This is not the first time the Russian Federation has done something like this.
In exchange for the extension of the agreement, the Kremlin demands that the sanctioned “Rossilhospbank” be reconnected to the SWIFT global financial messaging system and that sanctions against Russian food, fertilizers and agricultural machinery be eased.
The Financial Times wrote that the European Union can connect a subsidiary of “Rossilhospbank“ to SWIFT so that Russia can continue the agreement. The idea of creating an affiliated company was voiced by Moscow during negotiations with the participation of UN representatives. The issue was also discussed by EU leaders at the summit in Brussels last week. Some officials say that now Russiaʼs threats to terminate the agreement are more serious than before.