Russia pounds Ukrainian grain with missiles for fourth day

Russian missiles blasted Ukrainian grain warehouses in Odesa for the fourth day in a row, destroying more than 120 of crops meant for export — as the Kremlin’s fleet practiced seizing ships in the Black Sea.

The attacks were carried out with Kalibr cruise missiles fired from the Black Sea targeting the grain terminals of an agricultural business, Oleh Kiper, head of the Odesa regional military administration, wrote in a Telegram post Friday.

A pair of low-flying missiles ignited a fire at a farm storehouse, then a third struck during firefighting efforts, leaving two people injured.

“The enemy destroyed 100 tons of peas and 20 tons of barley,” Kiper said, adding that two people were injured in the attacks.

Photos released by the State Emergency Service of Ukraine showed an inferno raging among blasted metal buildings.

Russia trained its missiles at the Black Sea port city of Odesa this week after Moscow pulled out of a UN-brokered grain deal that created a safe corridor for Ukraine’s vital food exports. 

The UN warned that millions of people in poor countries around the world were at risk of going hungry, or even starving to death, as a result of the grain export deal’s collapse.

“Some will go hungry, some will starve, many may die as a result of these decisions,” UN aid chief Martin Griffiths told the Security Council.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he held talks with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who helped broker the export agreement with Russia last July.

“We coordinated efforts to restore the operation of the Black Sea Grain Initiative,” Zelensky wrote on his Telegram channel Friday. “Unlocking the grain corridor is an absolute priority.”

Zelensky blamed Russia for pushing the entire population to the brink of a global food crisis that he said could impact up to 400 million people in Africa and Asia.

Moscow claimed the missile volleys targeting Odesa were payback for a deadly Ukrainian attack Monday that damaged a key bridge connecting the illegally annexed Crimean peninsula to Russia’s mainland.

The Kremlin accused Ukraine of using the sea corridor beneath the 12-mile Kerch Bridge to launch “terrorist attacks.”

This week alone, more than 20 people, including two children, have been injured by Russian missile strikes on Odesa.

Amid the escalating tensions in the Black Sea, both Russia and Ukraine have exchanged warnings that they will treat ships traveling to each other’s ports as potential military targets.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry said it would deem all incoming vessels as carrying weapons and treat the country of its flag as a participant in the conflict on the Ukrainian side.

The Russian navy will inspect the vessels to make sure they aren’t carrying military cargo before taking any further action, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Vershinin said.

“There is no longer a sea humanitarian corridor, there is a zone of increased military danger,” he told a news briefing.

Also Friday, Russia’s navy carried out drills in which ships practiced blockading a section of the Black Sea. In the maneuvers, a missile boat fired anti-ship cruise missiles at a mock target.

The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said in its latest update that the recent strikes against port and grain infrastructure and threats of maritime escalation “are likely a part of a Kremlin effort to leverage Russia’s exit from the Black Sea Grain Initiative and exact extensive concessions from the West.”

Russia has said it will not re-enter the grain deal without better terms for its own food and fertilizer sales, prompting Western leaders to accuse Moscow of trying to dodge economic sanctions, which already exempt Russian food exports.

With Post wires