MOSCOW, August 9. /TASS/. Two bulk carriers under the flag of the Marshall Islands have sailed off from the Ukrainian ports under the initiative on mutual understanding on safe export of grain from Ukrainian ports, Mikhail Mizintsev, the headquarters head and chief of Russia’s National Defense Management Center, said on Friday.
"On August 12, 2022, as part of the initiative on mutual understanding on safe export of grain from Ukrainian ports, the Star Laura bulk carrier (Marshall Islands, loaded with 60,159 tonnes of corn) left the port of Yuzhny, and the Sormovsky bulk carrier (Belize, loaded with 3,050 tonnes of wheat) sailed off from the port of Chernomorsk," he said.
According to Mizintsev, who also heads the Russian Joint Coordination Headquarters for Humanitarian Response in Ukraine, fifty-seven ships from 14 countries are still blocked in the ports of Kherson, Nikolayev, Chernomorsk, Ochakov, Odessa, and Yuzhny.
Since August 1, fourteen ships have left Ukrainian ports. As many as 438,331 tonnes of food, including 367,981 tonnes of corn, 6,000 tonnes of sunflower oil, 50,300 tonnes of flour, 11,000 tonnes of soybeans, and 3,050 tonnes of wheat, have been exported.
"Risks for navigation and of damages to port infrastructure from drifting Ukrainian mines are still in place for the Black Sea littoral states," he stressed. "The Russian armed forces have created necessary conditions for the operation of two maritime humanitarian corridors.".