Russia halts grain deal, saying there is no link to the bridge attack it blames on Ukraine
(VOVWORLD) - Russia said on Monday that it had halted participation in a landmark UN-brokered deal which allowed Ukrainian grain to be exported through the Black Sea just hours after Moscow said Ukraine had attacked the Crimea Bridge.
 An armed ship sails next to Crimean bridge connecting the Russian mainland with the peninsula across the Kerch Strait, Crimea, July 17, 2023. (REUTERS/Stringer) |
Two people were killed and their daughter was wounded in what Russia cast as a terrorist attack on a major artery for Russian troops fighting in Ukraine.
Blasts were reported before dawn on the 19-km road and rail bridge linking Russia to Crimea, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014.
The Kremlin said the halting of the Black Sea grain deal, brokered by the United Nations and Turkey to combat a global food crisis had nothing to do with the bridge attack.
Russia and Ukraine are two of the world’s top agricultural producers, and major players in the wheat, barley, maize, rapeseed, rapeseed oil, sunflower seed and sunflower oil markets.