Ukraine called on the International Maritime Organization to send observers to the ports of Odessa

Shelling of Odessa port, photo: Oleg Kiper

Ukraine has officially appealed to the International Maritime Organization with a call to urgently send an international monitoring mission to the ports of Great Odesa against the background of intensified Russian terror.

Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha stated this during negotiations with representatives of the governments of the Nordic-Baltic eight countries (Sweden, Denmark, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Finland and Iceland), which took place in Odesa, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs reported.

«Here, in Odesa, the Russian aerial terror is particularly noticeable. Colleagues had the opportunity to see the consequences of barbaric Russian shelling. In general, during the full-scale invasion, there were more than 50 Russian attacks against our ports, as a result of which more than 300 port infrastructure objects and 23 civilian ships were damaged, more than 100 thousand tons of agricultural products were destroyed,» Andrii Sybiha said.

He reminded that only in the last month, Russian strikes damaged four ships, in particular with cargoes of grain for Egypt and corn for Italy, as well as a humanitarian cargo of the UN Food Program for Palestine.

«These are the targets Russia chooses for its strikes — civilian ships, grain warehouses, terminals. These are not just blows to our economy. These are blows to global food security. Russia puts millions of people in the world at risk of starvation,» the minister said.

We will remind that as a result of shelling of Odesa on October 6, a dry cargo civilian ship was damaged. People were not injured.

And on October 14, the Russian army attacked the port infrastructure of Odessa with a ballistic missile. One person died, eight others were injured.

Earlier, the European Union condemned the Russian attacks on civilian ships carrying Ukrainian grain and called for pressure on the Russian Federation to stop these attacks.