The grain terminal of the port of Odesa on Saturday. A Ukrainian official said the Russian strikes had caused 10 explosions in Odesa and that the attacks on the port had caused a fire. Credit… Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times
ODESSA, Ukraine — A series of explosions rocked the southern Ukrainian city of Odesa on Saturday, hitting one of the country’s most important ports less than 24 hours after a deal was signed to secure the transit of millions tons of grain through the Black Sea routes.
The strikes risk undermining the agreement to facilitate the shipment of Ukrainian grain, brokered by the United Nations and Turkey, before the deal could be implemented. The deal was seen as critical to bolstering global supplies after a sharp drop in Ukraine’s grain exports raised fears of food shortages in poorer countries.
Ukraine’s southern military command said on Saturday that Russian forces had fired four Kalibr cruise missiles at Odesa. “Two rockets were shot down by air defense forces, two port infrastructure facilities affected,” he wrote in a statement posted on his Facebook page.
Ukraine’s condemnation was swift. Oleg Nikolenko, the spokesman for the country’s foreign ministry, said on Facebook that with the strikes, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia “spat in the face” of United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres, and to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. after the two “have made an enormous effort to reach this agreement.”
There was no immediate comment from the Kremlin. The attack came a day before the Russian foreign minister was scheduled to begin a tour of Africa, where he is expected to try to shift the blame for food shortages to the West.
The blast wave from the missiles hitting the harbor could be heard from miles away, although it was unclear where they hit. The huge port stretches for miles along the Black Sea coast of Odesa with imposing silver grain silos clustered in several different locations.
It was not clear what the strikes were aimed at or whether any grain infrastructure was affected. Russia may not have technically violated the agreement, as it did not commit to refraining from attacking the parts of Ukrainian ports not directly used for grain exports, according to a senior UN official.
But the damage appeared to be extensive, and Mykola Solskyi, the country’s agriculture minister, said the strikes would hurt Ukraine’s efforts to export grain.
“If you attack one port, you attack everything,” he said in a telephone interview. “You use a lot of the same infrastructure for oil, for grain. It impacts everything, no matter what you touch.”
Solskyi added that some of the destroyed infrastructure was “important for processing all imports”, but said Ukraine would proceed as if the grain deal was still in force.
“We understand that we still have a war with Russia,” he said. “Our deal was with the United Nations and Turkey, not Russia.”
The strike in Odesa is part of a wider shift in the center of gravity of the fighting in recent weeks, from eastern Ukraine to the south of the country. Russian and Ukrainian forces launched long-range weapons strikes in the south overnight Saturday, apparently targeting supply lines and anti-aircraft weapons behind front lines on both sides.
Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine’s interior minister, said Russian strikes had caused 10 explosions in Odesa and strikes at the port had caused a fire.
“This is how Russia fulfills its responsibility to ensure the safe export of large Ukrainians,” he wrote on his public channel on the Telegram social media application. “Now not only the West, but China and other countries that Putin was counting on to ease the pressure of sanctions know that Putin cannot be trusted at all, not one ounce,” he added.
On Friday, Biden administration officials expressed skepticism on Friday that Russia would honor its commitments to allow safe passage of ships through the Black Sea.
Josep Borrell Fontelles, head of foreign policy for the European Union, condemned the strikes on Saturday, saying on Twitter that “attacking a crucial target for the export of cereals a day after the signing of the Istanbul agreements is particularly reprehensible and it demonstrates once again Russia’s total disregard for international law and commitments.”
Since the war began on February 24, the Port of Odesa, where the missiles hit, has been frozen in time. Steel bonds are stacked on loading docks ready for shipment, and multi-colored cranes stand inert like huge sleeping birds.
In the port of Odesa, as well as in five other major ports in the region, 68 ships have been stranded, along with some of their crew members, said Dmytro Barinov, the deputy head of the Sea Port Authority Ukraine The port authority has been providing sailors with food and allowing them access to the port’s air raid shelters when the air raid siren sounds, he said.
In return, they continue to service the ships.
“You can’t leave a ship alone,” said Mr. Barinov. “It must be maintained.”
— Michael Schwirtz, Erika Solomon and Matina Stevis-Gridneff