Russia’s War in Ukraine

Understanding the conflict four years on.

The Black Sea’s trade corridors are at the center of the Russia-Ukraine war again, as they were from 2022 to 2023, when a Russian naval blockade stopped Ukrainian maritime exports and shook agricultural markets worldwide. The current crisis looks similar, but it’s unique in important ways, as are the alternatives to resolve it.

On July 23, Ukraine announced that maritime transport to and from its three unoccupied Black Sea ports was effectively frozen. Russian missile and drone attacks in July alone targeted 57 Ukrainian and foreign-flagged merchant ships in ports and at sea, including Golden Leo, a Turkish-owned bulk cargo carrier sailing under the flag of Guinea-Bissau. Three Russian missiles struck it in open water off the coast of Odesa on July 19, killing 10 people; the ship sank on July 27. By then, this year’s strikes had already cut Ukraine’s grain exports by roughly a third and doubled shipping freight costs into and out of the country.

The Black Sea’s trade corridors are at the center of the Russia-Ukraine war again, as they were from 2022 to 2023, when a Russian naval blockade stopped Ukrainian maritime exports and shook agricultural markets worldwide. The current crisis looks similar, but it’s unique in important ways, as are the alternatives to resolve it.

On July 23, Ukraine announced that maritime transport to and from its three unoccupied Black Sea ports was effectively frozen. Russian missile and drone attacks in July alone targeted 57 Ukrainian and foreign-flagged merchant ships in ports and at sea, including Golden Leo, a Turkish-owned bulk cargo carrier sailing under the flag of Guinea-Bissau. Three Russian missiles struck it in open water off the coast of Odesa on July 19, killing 10 people; the ship sank on July 27. By then, this year’s strikes had already cut Ukraine’s grain exports by roughly a third and doubled shipping freight costs into and out of the country.

As in 2022-2023, when a Russian naval blockade trapped millions of tons of Ukrainian grain and sparked a global food crisis, Ukraine’s Black Sea ports are out of business due to the attacks, even if most of the facilities are still operable. Agricultural stocks are piling up, and global grain markets are tightening. Ukraine’s agricultural sector is staring at a direct loss in export revenue between $1.5 billion and $3 ​billion this year, according to its agriculture minister. Ukraine’s Black Sea maritime corridors handle approximately 90 percent of the........

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