Russians Continue Exporting Stolen Ukrainian Grain Through Berdiansk Port

A Russian ship carrying Ukrainian wheat left the port recently.

Russian occupiers continue exporting looted grain from Ukraine, as they have done in previous months.

According to information from the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces dated 16 March 2023, such actions are taking place in the Berdiansk port, the CFTS portal reports.

“Enemy tugs were seen pulling a Russian self-propelled barge loaded with wheat from the waters of the seaport in the city of Berdiansk, Zaporizhia region,” the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said.

A few days later, the so-called “chairman” of the temporarily Russia-occupied part of the Zaporizhia province Ye. Balytskyi said that the region planned to harvest about 2.5 million tons of grain this year, at least 1 million tons of which will be moved outside Ukraine.

It is assumed that they will be able to do this mainly by sea, particularly, via the port of Berdiansk.

As reported earlier, Russian occupiers sent the first ship loaded with 7,000 tons of stolen Ukrainian grains from the port of Berdiansk in June 2022 after capturing the city.

The Russians appropriated the Nova Khortytsia company’s dockside grain elevator in Berdiansk, the Asket Shipping company’s loading complex in the Berdiansk port, and the grain elevators of the Kernel, Optimus, and other grain traders in the city.

In addition, the Russian occupiers are known to have exported stolen Ukrainian grain through the port of Sevastopol.

Russia has been using the port of occupied Mariupol to export stolen Ukrainian rolled metal and ore since the summer of last year.

Stolen Ukrainian ore is sold by entities linked to Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), under whose patronage the plundering of Ukrainian resources is taking place.

The stolen grain is transported in two ways: by the Tokmak-Berdiansk railway and then via the port of Berdiansk to Tartus in Syria. Another way is the grain movement to the port of Sevastopol in Crimea and thence to Tartus.

It also recently became known that at the end of March, Russia illegally included the occupied ports of Berdyansk and Mariupol in the register of its seaports, which is contrary to international maritime conventions.