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Turkish, Ukrainian foreign ministers talk about steps to renew grain deal - source

The Black Sea Grain Initiative expired on July 17

ANKARA, August 5. /TASS/. Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan and his Ukrainian counterpart Dmitry Kuleba held phone talks, a source at the Turkish Foreign Ministry told TASS.

"The conversation focused on the steps that could be taken to revive the Black Sea Grain Initiative," he said.

The Black Sea Grain Initiative expired on July 17. After agreeing several times since the inception of the grain deal in July 2022 to extend the agreement in order to provide a shipping corridor across the Black Sea for vessels carrying Ukrainian grain, Moscow reiterated that the Russia-related provisions of the deal - waiving the obstacles for agricultural exports - were never implemented. Moscow repeatedly stressed that even though the agreements were designed to channel food to the poorest nations, the bulk of Ukrainian grain was shipped to the West’s developed countries. Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russia was willing to return to agreements as soon as its Moscow-related terms were implemented.

On July 27, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that Moscow was poised to supply each of six African countries (namely Burkina Faso, Zimbabwe, Mali, Somalia, the Central African Republic, and Eritrea) with 25,000-30,000 tons of grain for free within the next three or four months. The Russian leader also said that Moscow would provide free delivery of grain products to consumers.