Turkish media: UN-Russia meeting in Istanbul may activate grain deal

A meeting between representatives of Russia and the UN in Istanbul may become one of the options for activating the grain deal, the Turkish newspaper Milliyet writes.

It is claimed that the meeting could take place in a trilateral format with the participation of Ankara's representatives. If progress is made, Ukraine may join the negotiations.

The German newspaper Bild earlier claimed that a meeting on the grain deal was to be held in Budapest last week with the participation of Russia, Türkiye and Qatar. It is known that Türkiye's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Qatar's Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani and Tatarstan's head Rustam Minnikhanov visited Hungary on those dates.

The grain deal (Black Sea Initiative) was agreed in Istanbul by Russia, Ukraine, Türkiye and the UN in July 2022. The deal included two parts: an agreement on the safe export of Ukrainian grain from the ports of Odesa, Chernomorsk and Yuzhny, as well as an RF-UN memorandum on lifting restrictions on the access of Russian agricultural products and fertilizers to the world market. Moscow had long claimed that the second part was not being implemented and finally announced on 17 July that it had decided not to prolong the deal.