In Moscow, they said that there was no reason to extend the deal on grain

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia stated that Moscow does not see a reason to extend the grain deal, which expires on July 17. The department noted that the situation with the normalization of Russian supplies of food and fertilizer to world markets “continued to degrade.”

At the same time, the ministry emphasized that Russia is making the necessary efforts to ensure that all the courts participating in the agreement can leave the Black Sea before the agreement expires.

On July 3, the Financial Times newspaper, citing its sources, wrote that in order to preserve the grain deal, the EU is considering the possibility of connecting a “daughter” of Rosselkhozbank to SWIFT, despite the fact that this bank belongs to the Russian state. On Tuesday, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia called the idea “definitely impenetrable”, and indicated that it would take many months to open a branch.

In July of last year, Russia and Ukraine, with the participation of Turkey and the UN, signed an agreement on the export of Ukrainian grain from the Black Sea ports blocked after the Russian invasion. First of all, it was about the delivery of goods to developing countries. The term of the deal has been extended several times since then.

In May, when Moscow agreed to the next extension of the agreement for another two months, the Russian authorities emphasized that the agreement may be terminated if the obstacles to the export of Russian grain and fertilizer are not removed. One of the conditions in Moscow was the reconnection of Rosselkhozbank to the SWIFT international bank payment processing system. This bank, like many other Russian credit organizations, was disconnected from SWIFT as part of sanctions after the start of the war in Ukraine.

At the beginning of June, Ukraine accused Russia of a new suspension of the grain initiative. In Kyiv, they claimed that the Russian side had blocked the registration of vessels in all Ukrainian ports, and called these actions a “gross violation” of the agreements.