Diksia.com - UKRAINE, The Russian army is becoming increasingly violent in Ukraine.
On Wednesday (07/19/2023) local time, Russia launched a drone and missile attack on Odessa.
The attack damaged key port infrastructure in southern Ukraine, including grain and oil terminals, and injured at least 12 people.
Ukraine’s Agriculture Ministry said the attack crippled most grain export facilities in Odessa and Chornomorsk and destroyed 60,000 tons of wheat.
The attack came days after President Vladimir Putin withdrew Russia from its participation in the Black Sea Grain Initiative, a wartime treaty that allowed Ukrainian exports to reach many countries.
The attack also followed Putin’s promise to retaliate against Kiev for Monday’s attack on the Kerch Bridge, a key link between Russia and the Crimean peninsula that the Kremlin illegally annexed in 2014.
The Ministry of Agriculture, citing experts, estimates that it will take a year to restore the damaged facilities.
The shredded wheat should have been loaded onto ships and sent through the grain corridor two months ago, the statement said.
“If we cannot export food, the population of the poorest countries will be on the brink of survival!” Ukraine’s Agriculture Minister Mykola Solskyi told the Associated Press on Wednesday (07/19/2023).
“The price of wheat will increase and not all countries will be able to buy agricultural products, which means that food prices for flour, grain and meat will increase significantly,” Solskyi said.
Wheat prices rose more than 2.5 percent on Tuesday and more than 3 percent on Wednesday on Russia’s attack on Odessa, a key wheat export hub, pointing to concerns in global markets after Moscow’s exit from the grain deal and threatening to exacerbate hunger in some parts of the world.
However, Wednesday’s trading price of $6.91 a bushel is still more than 85% down from last year’s high.
Video from a warehouse elsewhere in Odessa showed firefighters putting out the fire as thick black smoke continued to rise from the blast.
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock wrote on Twitter: “Putin not only destroyed the Black Sea Wheat Initiative, now he has hit the port city of Odessa with a hail of bombs for the second time in a row.”
“By doing so, he stole the hope of Ukrainian wheat from the world. Every one of his bombs hit the poorest people in the world,” he said.
Baerbock pledged to help Ukraine “find any alternative mode of transportation,” perhaps via inland waterways, rail and road.
Governor By Kiper said Oniks and Kh-22 missiles hit grain and oil terminals in the attack. Debris from those shot down hit homes, a beach resort and warehouses, setting fires and injuring several people.
Ukrainian President Andriy Yermak’s chief of staff called for more anti-aircraft systems.
Meanwhile, Russian authorities in Crimea said more than 2,200 people were evacuated from four villages because of a fire at a military facility.
The fire forced the closure of a key highway, according to Sergei Aksyonov, Moscow’s appointed head of the peninsula. He did not provide any information on the cause of the fire in the plant in the Kirov district.
Across Ukraine, authorities are reporting that drones and missiles have been deployed to more areas than in recent days.
“A difficult night of airstrikes for all of Ukraine,” Serhii Popko, head of the military administration of the city of Kyiv, said in a statement on Telegram.
He said it was a major attack in Odessa carried out over two consecutive nights. The southern Ukrainian military task force reported that at least 12 civilians were injured in the region.
At least six people were injured in the attack in Odessa, including a nine-year-old boy who was crushed by broken glass and debris.
The remnants of the downed Kh-59 missile left a large hole in another part of the city, injuring three civilians and damaging several buildings.
Eight Iranian-made Shahed drones were also shot down in the greater Odessa area, where two warehouses filled with tobacco and firecrackers were reportedly damaged.
Russia also unsuccessfully attacked Kiev with Shahed drones, Popko said.
Air defense managed to intercept all drones aimed at the capital, and initial surveys revealed no casualties.
Meanwhile, a few hours after the attack, President Volodymyr Zelenskyi received Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar in Kiev.
He thanked him for his support in the war that Russia started in February 2022.
In a statement published on Telegram, Zelenskyy noted that Ireland’s neutrality “does not mean indifference, and that is very important.”
