Russian Strikes Force Shipowners to Suspend Black Sea Port Calls in Ukraine

KYIV, July 23 (Reuters) – Shipowners halted vessel arrivals at Ukraine's Black Sea ports due to intensified Russian strikes, Kyiv said, as President Volodymyr Zelenskiy warned Moscow might escalate attacks in order to block the country's main corridor for grain exports.

In recent weeks, Russia has pummeled logistics and port infrastructure in the southern Odesa region with missiles and drones. On Sunday, a missile strike on a ship carrying corn killed 10 people, mostly foreigners, Ukrainian officials said.

"Yesterday… not a single ship entered the port," Zelenskiy told reporters on Thursday. "They've been hitting all the ships. They're going to step this up."

Russia struck 28 civilian vessels and killed 21 people from June 20 to July 20, according to Odesa regional prosecutors cited by local media.

Shipowners — wary of the attacks — have temporarily suspended vessel arrivals meant to pick up agricultural products at the ports, Ukraine's agriculture minister Taras Vysotskyi said on Wednesday.

"Ukraine, as a state, has not imposed any restrictions," Vysotskyi was cited as saying by Interfax-Ukraine.

The suspension reflects a rapidly deteriorating situation for Ukraine's port logistics and export capacity, key for an economy that has been ravaged by Russia's war.

As of last week, Ukraine, a major agricultural producer, has lost about a third of its capacity to export grain via the Black Sea ports due to strikes, traders and analysts have said.

Moscow says it is hitting port infrastructure and vessels that support the Ukrainian military.

Ukraine has also increased attacks on vessels, mostly carrying fuel, in the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea, in an expanding campaign aimed at isolating Russia-occupied Crimea and undermining Moscow's key revenue sources.

On Wednesday, Russia introduced a temporary nighttime ban on vessel movements in and out of Novorossiysk port, its biggest port by volume that handles up to one third of its grain exports.

Ukraine's acting foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, called Russian strikes at peak harvest a "deliberate economic and humanitarian terror."

Ukraine has requested an urgent U.N. Security Council meeting for July 27 to address the matter, he added on X.

Vysotskyi called on producers and traders not to rush sales, saying the situation could be rapidly changing. He also pointed to alternative routes for exports via the Danube ports and so-called dry ports of the railway, saying both options have not been fully utilized.

"A single day in our market has no impact on total export volumes for the year. Neither does a week. A month has no impact either. But several months – that does have an impact," he said.