First ship carrying Ukrainian grain since Russia invaded leaves Odesa


 AUGUST 1, 2022 / / CBS/AP

Ankara, Turkey — The first ship carrying Ukrainian grain set off from the port of Odesa on Monday under an internationally brokered deal that's expected to release large stores of Ukrainian crops to foreign markets and ease a growing global hunger crisis.

The Sierra Leone-flagged cargo ship Razoni left Odesa for Lebanon, Turkey's defense ministry said. A statement from the United Nations said the Razoni was carrying over 26,000 tons of corn.

The Sierra Leone-flagged ship Razoni leaves Odesa on August 1, 2022. 

UKRAINIAN NAVAL FORCES VIA REUTERS

The ship is expected to reach Istanbul on Tuesday, where it will be inspected, before being allowed to proceed, the Turkish ministry said.

The corn will head to Lebanon, a tiny Mideast nation in the grips of what the World Bank has described as one of the world's worst financial crises in more than 150 years. A 2020 explosion at its main port in Beirut shattered its capital city and destroyed grain silos there.

"The first grain ship since #RussianAggression has left port. Thanks to the support of all our partner countries & @UN we were able to full implement the Agreement signed in Istanbul," the Reuters news agency quoted Ukrainian Infrastructure Minister Alexander Kubrakov as tweeting.

"Today Ukraine, together with partners, is taking another step towards preventing world hunger," Kubrakov said adding it would also help Ukraine.

"Unlocking ports will provide at least $1 billion in foreign exchange revenue to the economy and an opportunity for the agricultural sector to plan for next year," he said.

Agence France-Presse quotes Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba as calling the development a "relief for the world."

"The day of relief for the world, especially for our friends in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa, as the first Ukrainian grain leaves Odesa after months of Russian blockade. Ukraine has always been a reliable partner and will remain one should Russia respect its part of the deal," Kuleba tweeted.

The Kremlin called the departure "very positive."

The Turkish ministry statement said other ships would also depart Ukraine's ports through the safe corridors in line with deals signed in Istanbul on July 22, but didn't provide further details.

Russia and Ukraine signed separate agreements with Turkey and the U.N. clearing the way for Ukraine - one of the world's key breadbaskets - to export 22 million tons of grain and other agricultural goods that have been stuck in Black Sea ports because of Russia's invasion.

The deals also allow Russia to exports grain and fertilizers.

United Nations chief Antonio Guterres said in a statement he "warmly welcomes" the ship's departure.

Founder of Ukraine grain firm killed by Russian shelling as shipments set to resume

Oleksiy Vadaturskyi was the multi-millionaire owner of Nibulon, one of Ukraine's largest agricultural companies

The first ship to export Ukrainian grain under a safe transit deal may depart Monday, Turkish TV reports

Lebanon has seized a ship loaded with barley and wheat flour while it determines whether the cargo may have been stolen from Ukraine

The ship Navi-Star sits full of grain since Russia's invasion of Ukraine began five months ago as it waits to sail from the Odesa Sea Port, in Odesa, Ukraine, Friday, July 29, 2022. (AP Photo/David Goldman)


Bloomberg News reporters
July 31 2022

The multi-millionaire owner of Nibulon, one of Ukraine's largest agricultural companies, died during a Russian attack on the southern city of Mykolaiv on Sunday, according to the region's governor.

Oleksiy Vadaturskyi and his wife Raisa Vadaturska were killed in their home during shelling that hit several targets, including schools, a sports complex and private residences, governor Vitaliy Kim said in a post on Telegram.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy expressed his condolences, calling the deaths "a great loss for Mykolaiv and the whole Ukraine".

Vadaturskyi, 74, founded Nibulon in 1991 with partners from the UK and Hungary, according to the company's website.

Over the decades it expanded into one of the country's largest grain storage and logistics companies, operating in at least eight of Ukraine's 27 regions and employing some 7,000 people. Nibulon developed its own river fleet to transport grain to export terminals.

Named a "Hero of Ukraine", the nation's top civilian honour, in 2007, Vadaturskyi was also awarded the title "Man of the Year" in Mykolaiv for his contributions to Ukraine's agricultural sector.

"His contribution to the development of the agricultural and shipbuilding industry, the development of the region, is invaluable," Kim wrote. Forbes in 2021 ranked Vadaturskyi the 24th wealthiest Ukrainian, with a net worth of $430m.

Born into a farming family in Ukraine's Odesa region, Vadaturskyi started his career as an chemical engineer after graduating from the Odesa Technological Institute. He specialised in bread production and distribution in Mykolaiv before starting Nibulon.

"Oleksiy Vadaturskiy and his company were never afraid of challenges and were guided by love to their neighbourhood," Zelenskiy said in a statement. "They were inspired themselves and inspired the others. They were an example to follow."

Grain shipments to resume

Meanwhile, the first ship to export Ukrainian grain since an agreement was reached for the safe transit of vessels may depart as soon as Monday, Turkey’s Haberturk TV reported, citing President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's spokesman Ibrahim Kalin.

More than a week after Russia and Ukraine reached a deal aimed at releasing millions of tonnes of grain through three Black Sea ports, no ships have sailed.

Ukraine said on Friday that it's close to restarting shipments, although the timing was linked to receiving go-ahead from the United Nations, which, along with Turkey, was a signatory to the July 22 agreement. The UN has declined to name a day.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy visited the Black Sea port of Chornomorsk on Friday, where he watched grain being loaded onto a Turkish vessel.

Ukraine is one of the world's biggest wheat, corn and vegetable-oil suppliers, and crop markets are watching closely for concrete moves toward unlocking Ukraine's ports.

While there's has been incremental progress -- Ukraine's Sea Ports Authority earlier told companies a test boat would sail soon, and a group of insurers set up a programme to cover cargoes of food from Ukraine -- traders and exporters are still waiting for information about how and when vessels will depart, and to where.

Ship owners face a myriad of challenges, including recruiting crews to operate the ships as safety concerns remain. A Russian attack on Odesa's sea port with cruise missiles hours after signing the deal also raised questions about its commitment.

Lebanon seizes grain shipment

Lebanon has seized a ship loaded with barley and wheat flour while it determines whether the cargo may have been stolen from Ukraine, said Public Prosecutor Ghassan Oueidat.

The Ukrainian embassy in Beirut said the vessel was loaded at Feodosia in the Russian-occupied peninsula of Crimea, and that the commodities originated from Zaporizhzhia, Mykolaiv and Kherson in south-eastern Ukraine.

The embassy accused Russia of stealing more than 500,000 tonnes during its occupation of the three regions. While Russia denies stealing grain, it has publicly touted the resumption of grain shipments from occupied ports.

Grain shipments from Crimea have surged since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February, which analysts say indicates Ukrainian grain is being exported. Exports from Crimea are sanctioned by the European Union and the US.

The cargo ship Laodicea arrived at Tripoli in northern Lebanon on July 27, according to ship-tracking data monitored by Bloomberg. It will be held while Lebanon carries out an investigation into the cargo's origin, Oueidat told Bloomberg.

Russia’s war in Ukraine finds echoes in the Balkans

Analysis by Ishaan Tharoor

Columnist

August 1, 2022 

A person walks past a partly vandalized mural depicting Russian President Vladimir Putin in Belgrade, Serbia, on June 2. (Andrej Isakovic/AFP/Getty Images)

A couple months after launching Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin tried to justify his war by pointing to the Western Balkans. In a meeting with United Nations Secretary General António Guterres, Putin pointed to the legacy of the NATO intervention in the former Yugoslavia in 1999, a bombing campaign that hit targets across what was then combined Serbia and Montenegro in a bid to halt Serbia’s onslaught against ethnic Kosovar Albanians fighting for autonomy. The brief war and subsequent peacekeeping operation led to the emergence of the independent nation of Kosovo.

The Western alliance’s actions then, Putin suggested, were no different than what his forces sought to do now in attempting to guarantee the independence of two pro-Kremlin separatist entities in the eastern Ukrainian region known as Donbas. “Very many states of the West recognized [Kosovo] as an independent state,” Putin told Guterres. “We did the same in respect of the republics of Donbas.”

There are plenty of reasons to scoff at this analogy, not least because Russia still does not recognize Kosovo’s independence and vociferously decried NATO’s war against their Serbian ally. NATO airstrikes led to Serbian civilian casualties, but they also helped stave off further rounds of violent ethnic cleansing in the Balkans and stabilize a crisis that had already seen thousands killed and hundreds of thousands more displaced. Putin’s invasion, meanwhile, is defined by the Kremlin’s genocidal rhetoric as well as garish reports of atrocities carried out by Russian troops. It has led to millions of Ukrainians fleeing their homes.

Kosovo President Vjosa Osmani sees an all-together different parallel. The NATO-enabled victory of Kosovo’s fighters over the regime of then-Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic was part of a broader struggle for human rights, the rule of law and democratic principles. “Twenty-three years ago these values were at stake in Kosovo and beyond,” Osmani told me during a Thursday interview in Washington. “Twenty-three years on, it’s the same — these values are at stake in Ukraine.”

Russia’s campaign in Ukraine doesn’t deserve any patina of international legitimacy. It reflects simply, in Osmani’s view, the “sick, imperial tendencies” of the Russian president.

Putin makes his imperial pretensions clear

Osmani was in Washington this past week along with her country’s prime minister, Albin Kurti. They had meetings with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and inked a landmark investment deal with the Millennium Challenge Corporation, a U.S. government entity, which committed $237 million in funding for Kosovo’s energy infrastructure.

But in her conversation with Today’s WorldView, Osmani also warned of the wider perils facing her region, where Russian influence has historically played an outsize role.

“Putin’s aim is to expand the conflict in other parts of the world,” she said. “Since his aim has constantly been to destabilize Europe, we can expect that one of his targets might be the Western Balkans.”

Just this weekend, tensions flared between Kosovo and Serbia. Ethnic Serbs in northern municipalities in Kosovo blockaded roads and skirmished with detachments of police in response to Kosovo authorities’ decision to require vehicles that enter from Serbia to replace their license plates with Kosovo plates; the reverse is necessary for vehicles from Kosovo entering Serbia.

The bureaucratic dispute belied the far greater tensions simmering beneath. Top officials engaged in a war of words. Kurti accused Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic of instigating the violence. Vucic said the two parties had “never been in a more complex situation than today” but vowed Serbian victory regardless. The small NATO mission in Kosovo felt compelled to issue a statement, saying it was “prepared to intervene if stability is jeopardized.”

Also of immediate concern is the situation in Bosnia, whose complex political arrangement that cobbled together its ethnic Bosniak, Croat and Serb populations is looking wobblier than ever. Analysts believe Milorad Dodik, the leader of the semiautonomous ethnic Serb republic within the Bosnian federation, is pushing for a more clear-cut breakaway that could unleash new turmoil in the region. His efforts find close support in both Moscow and Belgrade.

Serbia is, after all, a historic Russian ally and, in Osmani’s words, “fertile ground” for Putin’s influence operations. While most of Europe’s leaders have pursued hostile measures against the Kremlin, Vucic has not. He refused to join the E.U. sanctions regime on Russia. He inked a lucrative gas deal with Moscow earlier this summer even as the rest of the continent is trying to wean itself off Russian energy exports. And as his own nationalist rule has led to an erosion of Serbian democracy and mounting concerns over press freedom, Vucic has also allowed Russian state propaganda outfits to remain operating in Serbia. They play a significant role in fueling polarization in the region.

Analysts point to a wider malaise. “In place of the vision of joining a peaceful, prosperous Europe, there is a growing sense of stagnation in which each country’s historical grievances and unfinished business fester as perennial features of election campaigns and potential conflict triggers,” noted a recent report from the International Crisis Group. “Leaders fan the flames with divisive rhetoric, trying to divert attention from sluggish economies, low living standards, corruption and nepotism.”

Pro-Putin European leaders reassert their power

Osmani views Vucic’s behavior as that of an autocrat who shouldn’t be appeased. Beyond Serbia’s territorial claims in Kosovo, she points to Belgrade’s hand in the instability provoked in Bosnia as well as the alleged pro-Kremlin effort to foment a coup in Montenegro in 2016 to stop its accession into NATO (The attempt failed and some of its alleged ringleaders have been jailed). Lingering visions of a “greater Serbia” animate Vucic’s movement.

On Sunday, a ruling party member of Serbia’s parliament even tweeted that Serbia may “also be forced to begin the denazification of the Balkans,” invoking the same spurious framing through which Putin justified his invasion of Ukraine. Vucic “looks at our countries as temporary countries and tries to deny our very existence,” Osmani said. It is “the very way Putin looks at Ukraine, Moldova and other countries. It is exactly the same strategy.”

Serbia, unlike Russia, is a candidate for European Union membership and occupies a more complicated position within Europe. But the new geopolitics triggered by the Russian invasion of Ukraine has pushed Vucic into a corner.

“They have chosen their path,” Osmani said. “At this time, the Putin path and the European Union path are two different paths and have never been further apart and you can’t walk on both.

“When you have a neighbor that chooses to be on the wrong side of history at this very difficult time for Europe and beyond, it damages the rest of us as well.”

Kosovo, meanwhile, knows which direction it wants to go, but it has a complicated road ahead. It lacks U.N. recognition; Russia’s Security Council veto remains a fundamental impediment; and a considerable chunk of the international community has yet to acknowledge its status as a sovereign, independent nation — including five countries within the European Union.

Osmani believes that may change in the current environment, with the war in Ukraine also giving a boost to Kosovo’s “Euro-Atlantic integration.” She cited Finland and Sweden’s dramatic accession bids to NATO.

“As we all know, to be safe is to be in NATO,” Osmani said, urging the alliance’s member states to “start accelerated steps … toward welcoming also Kosovo and Bosnia into NATO.

Earlier this year, the European Union also fast-tracked the process to confer candidate status to Ukraine, a mark of the continent’s admiration for the Ukrainian struggle. Some critics in the Western Balkans feared this would only further delay their own nations’ stagnating membership bids.

But Osmani disagrees. “For way too long, we felt and heard the enlargement fatigue within the European Union,” she said. “The openness the European Union has shown toward Ukraine has turned the tide in a way that finally the E.U. sees the enlargement process as a geostrategic process rather than a bureaucratic one.”

And what should that strategic vision be?

“A Europe whole and free and at peace is impossible without the Western Balkans,” Osmani said.

War in Ukraine: What you need to know

The latest: The United Nations has expressed hope that the first grain shipments from blockaded Ukrainian ports could start Friday. However, the exact coordinates needed to ensure a safe passage for ships were still being negotiated on Thursday, U.N. aid chief Martin Griffiths said.

The fight: Russia’s recent operational pause, which analysts identified in recent weeks as an effort to regroup troops before doubling down on Ukraine’s south and east, appears to be ending. Russia appears set to resume ground offensives, with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu telling troops on Saturday to intensify attacks “in all operational sectors” of Ukraine.

The weapons: Ukraine is making use of weapons such as Javelin antitank missiles and Switchblade “kamikaze” drones, provided by the United States and other allies. Russia has used an array of weapons against Ukraine, some of which have drawn the attention and concern of analysts.

Photos: Post photographers have been on the ground from the very beginning of the war — here’s some of their most powerful work.

How you can help: Here are ways those in the U.S. can help support the Ukrainian people as well as what people around the world have been donating.

Read our full coverage of the Russia-Ukraine crisis. Are you on Telegram? Subscribe to our channel for updates and exclusive video.

Show more

By Ishaan Tharoor

Ishaan Tharoor is a columnist on the foreign desk of The Washington Post, where he authors the Today's WorldView newsletter and column. He previously was a senior editor and correspondent at Time magazine, based first in Hong Kong and later in New York.  Twitter

Brutal murder of Nigerian man in Italy prompts George Floyd comparison
Josephine Mckenna
Aug 01 2022

SCREENGRAB/TWITTER
An attack in which a Nigerian street vendor was wrestled to the ground and killed has been likened to the killing of George Floyd in the US in 2020.

Content warning: This story contains details of violence which some readers may find distressing.

Footage of a Nigerian man being beaten to death in front of onlookers in a small Italian town has prompted protests and claims of worsening racism in the country.

Alika Ogorchukwu, a 39-year-old street vendor, was beaten with his own crutch on a busy street in the coastal town of Civitanova Marche around lunchtime on Friday (local time) after reportedly directing a comment to the female companion of the man who killed him.

The attacker reportedly used his knee to crush Ogorchukwu’s head to the ground, prompting comparisons by one Italian newspaper to the killing of George Floyd by police in the US state of Minneapolis in 2020.

There was widespread anger and dismay on social media after several onlookers filmed the killing but failed to intervene. In the video, which has been widely shared on social media, a voice is heard shouting: “You will kill him like that”.

Police have arrested a 32-year-old Italian man on suspicion of murder.

Ogorchukwu’s wife, Charity Oriachi, said on Sunday that she was struggling to come to terms with her husband’s brutal murder and feels shocked at the failure of witnesses to intervene.


CHIARA GABRIELLI/AP
Charity Oriachi is demanding justice after her husband's murder.

“I just want to say I lived for my husband. I want justice,” Oriachi said from her home, where she was surrounded by friends and supporters.

Oriachi joined dozens of protesters in a street protest in Civitanova on Saturday, where another protest is planned next weekend. Ogorchukwu, the father of an 8-year-old son, was well-known in the town.

Italian politicians across the spectrum have spoken out against the Marche murder but Giorgia Meloni, leader of the far-right Brothers of Italy, and Matteo Salvini, head of the right-wing Northern League, were criticised for taking too long to react to the murder on Saturday.

Salvini used the incident to complain about crime levels and later published figures highlighting a jump in undocumented migrant arrivals. Meloni said there was “no justification for such brutality”.

CHIARA GABRIELLI/AP
A woman places a bouquet of flowers where Ogorchukwu was killed.

Ogorchukwu’s killing has focused fresh attention on the Marche region where Luca Traini, a far-right extremist, shot and wounded six African migrants in Macerata in February 2018, just weeks before previous national elections.

Daniel Amanze, the president of the non-profit Migrant Services Association in Marche, accused the country’s right-wing politicians of promoting a xenophobic climate of racism and hatred that had worsened since the Macerata attack.

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“There is zero tolerance, people can react however they want,” Amanze told The Telegraph. “We are living in fear. Politicians speak about security, but it’s not for all citizens.”

Fabrizio Ciarapica, the newly elected, centre-right mayor of Civitanova, defended his town on Facebook, saying it was a “generous, peaceful and supportive” community and that the council had pledged to provide €15,000 (NZ$24,384) to the victim’s family for funeral expenses and other support.

In a separate incident, a Moroccan man is in a critical condition in hospital after he was stabbed in a bar in the town of Recanati, around 13 miles from Civitanova Marche, on Friday night.

The Telegraph

New wildfires rage in France and Portugal as temperatures spike

• BY JULIA HENRY
• AUGUST 1, 2022

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A man watches as smoke rises from a wildfire in Venda do Pinheiro in Mafra, Portugal on July 31, 2022. © Pedro Nunes, Reuters 

Portugal and France on Sunday battled major forest fires as temperatures rose sharply this weekend.

In Portugal, a blaze broke out in the Mafra area, north of Lisbon, while in France at least four firefighters were seriously injured and motorways were closed.

Around 400 firefighters were drafted in to fight the blaze around 40 kilometres (25 miles) north of Lisbon.

Residents tried to slow the advance of the flames by hosing their gardens, as the flames also swept through neighbouring forests, according to television images.

A retirement home housing 30 people was evacuated as a precautionary measure, Commander Paulo Santos of the Civil Protection Authority told Renascenca radio.

Elsewhere, other major outbreaks raged in northern and central Portugal, requiring over 1,000 firefighters.

In central Ourem, a river beach was also evacuated as a precaution, while two people suffered smoke inhalation, according to an emergency official quoted by the Lusa agency.

Parts of northern and central Portugal were placed on alert this weekend in the face of “steep temperature rises” to more than 40 degrees Celsius, (104 degrees Fahrenheit) expected to last until at least Tuesday, according to the meteorological institute.

Experts blame climate change for the soaring temperatures—and warn that worse is yet to come.

Portugal, which remains traumatised by the deadly fires of 2017 which killed more than 100 people, was also hit in early July by a series of fires fanned by scorching temperatures.

Since the beginning of the year, more than 58,000 hectares (143,000 acres) have gone up in smoke, according to the latest, still provisional, data from the Institute for the Conservation of Nature and Forests (ICNF).

New fires, meanwhile, broke out in southeastern France on Sunday, with 350 hectares burned in Gard where a firefighter was seriously injured, and 35 hectares near Marseille hit, causing the partial closures of motorways.

“Four firefighters are injured,” announced Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin in a tweet about the fire which broke out around 3:00 pm in a pine forest in the town of Aubais, south of Nimes.

One of them was “seriously injured” and had to be evacuated by helicopter to the Montpellier hospital centre for burns to the hands and face.

The others were more slightly injured following a reversal of the flames by the wind which partly destroyed their vehicle, Eric Agrinier, who coordinated the operations, told AFP.

(AFP)

California wildfire: McKinney Fire spreads rapidly in north of state

By Alys Davies
BBC News

Published

Wildfire in California grows to more than 50,000 acres in 48 hours.

Hundreds of firefighters in California are battling the largest wildfire to spread in the state so far this year.

The McKinney Fire, which started in the northern Siskiyou county on Friday, has already burnt 21,000 hectares (52,500 acres), the state's fire service said.

At least 2,000 residents as well as trekkers on the Pacific Crest hiking trail have left the area, authorities say. Homes have been destroyed.

It was 0% contained as of Sunday, the emergency service's latest report said.

A red flag warning indicating the threat of dangerous fire conditions is in place, as California suffers from persistent drought conditions.

A state of emergency was declared in Siskiyou county on Saturday, after homes were destroyed and infrastructure was threatened, state governor Gavin Newsom said.

The fire was "intensified and spread by dry fuels, extreme drought conditions, high temperatures, winds and lightning storms", he added.

Authorities warn that possible thunderstorms could result in more fires developing in the coming days.

The US Forest Service warned that conditions could be "extremely dangerous for firefighters, as winds can be erratic, and extremely strong, causing the fire to spread in any direction".

Meteorologist Brad Schaaf told the New York Times, however, that smoke from the McKinney blaze could lower temperatures, which would then counteract some of the dangerous "thunderstorm ingredients".

The fire is the second major blaze to hit the state in recent days. The Oak Fire, near Yosemite National Park, is still roaring after eight days but has been 67% contained, the fire department Cal Fire said.

California, which is facing serious drought conditions, still has months of its fire season ahead.

Climate change increases the risk of the hot, dry weather that is likely to fuel wildfires.

The world has already warmed by about 1.1C since the industrial era began and temperatures will keep rising unless governments around the world make steep cuts to emissions.