“As soon as the Russian part of the agreements is fulfilled, the Russian side will return to the implementation of this deal, immediately,” Peskov added.
European Union Commission President Ursula von der Leyen called Russia’s decision to suspend a Black Sea grain export deal a “cynical move”, adding that the EU would continue to work towards ensuring food security for poor countries.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said that he believed Russian President Vladimir Putin wants the continuation of the deal, adding that he will discuss it when they meet in person in August.
Denys Marchuk, deputy head of the Ukrainian Agrarian Council, the main agribusiness organisation in Ukraine, said alternative routes such as river ports were more expensive to use in terms of transportation costs.
However, he expected a solution.
“As an option, why don’t we assess the possibility of the continuation of the grain deal without Russia? We had experience of this already in November 2022,” he added.
The reaction on the grains market was modest, with US wheat futures up about 3 per cent and European futures up about 2 per cent, a German grains trader said.
“I think there is market belief that Russia and the EU have large supplies of wheat which can meet world demand in the coming months, with harvests arriving,” he added.
However, Hasnain Malik, head of equity research at Tellimer Research said: “Suspension of the Black Sea deal is not unexpected and may bring to an end the recent softening of commodity grain prices. That’s bad news for smaller and poorer importers in emerging markets such as Egypt.”
A key Russian demand has been for the Russian Agricultural Bank (Rosselkhozbank) to be reconnected to the SWIFT international payments system. The bank was cut off from SWIFT by the European Union in June 2022 over Russia’s invasion.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres made a final effort on Tuesday to convince Russian President Vladimir Putin to extend the grain deal for several months in exchange for the EU connecting a subsidiary of Rosselkhozbank to SWIFT for grain and fertiliser transactions, sources said.
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