Millions of tons of grain shipments sit idle in Russia; Lithuanian FM calls for shipping corridor to export Ukrainian grain

Ukraine is the setting of Russia’s months-long invasion, but the impacts are being felt far beyond. Key shipments are being blocked, driving up food costs and putting people in danger of going hungry.

Russia lost another high-ranking officer in one of its latest battles in the eastern region of Ukraine. Still, it is pressing ahead in its drive to control the Ukrainian stronghold of Severodonetsk and the areas around it.

Russia’s defense minister, Sergei Shoigu, said, “Ninety-seven percent of the Luhansk region has been liberated.”

He added that forces in the south have finished removing mines from the city of Mariupol, and grain shipments can resume through the Black Sea.

But Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says the Russians are preventing exports, and up to 25 million tons of grain are sitting idle.

He said, “Our ports are blocked. We can’t export grain, barley… our sunflower oil. The Russians have stolen our grain. They stole it and carried it away on ships.”

The president says shipments from territory seized by the Russians would amount to looting.

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has headed to Turkey for discussions with leaders. Food exports are expected to be the main talking point.

Meanwhile, the foreign minister of Lithuania Gabrielius Landsbergis on Tuesday proposed opening a safe shipping corridor on the Black Sea to allow the resumption of grain exports from Ukraine.

He said the invasion of Ukraine has proven that Russia is “an aggressive neighbor ready and willing to use military force to attack its neighbors.”

He also said his country shares a 700-kilometer border with Belarus, whose territory was used by Russian troops to attack Ukraine.

He noted that with the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad to the west, Lithuania is “squeezed in between two aggressors.”

Landsbergis indicated that the Baltic country will ask NATO to deploy more troops to its territory. Lithuania is a member of the military alliance.

About the Russian blockade of southern Ukrainian ports that is preventing grain exports, he said that creating a “secure corridor could be one of the options.”

He called on Western countries to provide weapons to Ukraine so its ships won’t be attacked by Russian forces, adding that a security guarantee is needed.

The minister proposed a convoy made up of vessels from willing countries to escort grain transport ships from Odesa to the Bosphorus Strait.

He indicated that he will ask Japan and other countries to take part.

Lithuania’s relations with China have deteriorated after the Baltic nation allowed Taiwan to open a representative office under its own name last year.

Landsbergis said exports to China have dropped to almost zero.

He also said China’s actions against Lithuania “clearly showed to what extent China can go when it wants to change one country’s foreign policy.”

But he said the ties between like-minded democratic societies are much stronger and the trust that builds through these ties is “much more long-lasting and practically also much more beneficial to the countries.”