A meeting between Russians and Ukrainians on the issue of grain exports | War in Ukraine

Ukraine is one of the world's leading producers of wheat, but tens of millions of tonnes have been sleeping in silos since Russia launched its invasion and blocked ports in February.

A meeting between Russians and Ukrainians in the presence of UN representatives is due to open in Turkey on Wednesday on the difficult issue of grain exports via the Black Sea, against a backdrop of increased financial aid from Westerners to kyiv.

Military delegations from the Turkish, Russian and Ukrainian Defense Ministries, as well as a United Nations delegation, will hold talks in Istanbul on the safe delivery to international markets of grain waiting in Ukrainian ports , Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said on Tuesday. search ships to avoid arms smuggling.

Ukraine, for its part, said it was in favor of settling the issue of unblocking Ukrainian grain under the auspices of the UN.

We have seen for a few weeks that Russia has been asking condition after condition for such a meeting, so I remain cautious, said the head of French diplomacy, Catherine Colonna, on Tuesday evening.

< p class="e-p">Still on the diplomatic front, the Kremlin announced on Tuesday a bilateral meeting between Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose country is mediating between kyiv and Moscow. The two men will meet on the sidelines of a summit on Syria on July 19 in Tehran, with their Iranian counterpart Ebrahim Raisi.

Iran is preparing to deliver hundreds of drones to Russia, according to Washington.

Iranian generals visit underground site with drones.

In this context, the United States announced on Tuesday that it would provide an additional $1.7 billion in aid to Ukraine.

This should bring the total amount paid by the Americans to the Ukrainians since the outbreak of the war to 4 billion.

This new contribution is part of the 7.5 billion dollars promised to kyiv by US President Joe Biden in May.

In Brussels, the finance ministers of the Member States of the European Union meanwhile gave the green light to the payment of one billion euros to Ukraine, increasing to 2, 2 billion euros the total financial assistance of the Twenty-Seven to this country since the beginning of the Russian invasion on February 24.

European Commissioner for Justice Didier Reynders for his part pointed out that around 13.8 billion euros in the assets of oligarchs and entities had been frozen in the ;EU in the context of sanctions against Russia.

In the field of military operations, the Ukrainian army claimed to have bombed enemy forces overnight from Monday to Tuesday in the occupied Kherson region, while Russian missiles rained heavily on Mykolaiv, further west.

A map of the Russian invasion of Ukraine made using data from OpenStreetMap.< /p>

On the southern front, Ukraine said it struck Russian troops in Nova Kakhovka overnight Monday-Tuesday, killing 52 soldiers and destroying a depot of ammunition.

Videos on social media showed a smoke mushroom tens of meters high. The Russian-installed occupation authorities, who accused the Ukrainian army of hitting houses and killing at least seven people, denounced an act of terrorism.

Adjacent to the Crimean peninsula annexed by Moscow in 2014, this area is largely in the hands of the Russian military.

The Ukrainians have been leading a counter-offensive there for several weeks while the bulk of the Russian units are deployed in the mining region of Donbass, in the east.

In the southern part of Ukraine, the Russians carried out massive missile strikes on Mykolaiv early on Tuesday, hitting two medical facilities and apartment buildings. housing, according to the mayor of this city Oleksandr Senkevych.

Mykolaiv is an industrial and port city in southern Ukraine.

He also spoke on Tuesday evening of the complete destruction of a school, announcing an overall toll of 12 injured. At least 19 Smerch and Tornado missiles were fired, said regional governor Vitaly Kim, who said 12 were injured.

Russian terror has long since crossed the line beyond which it has become obvious to many in the civilized world that punishing Russia […] is a matter of global security, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky commented.

The war continues. Not a day goes by without Russian bombardment, insisted the Ukrainian president in his address on Tuesday evening.

The Russian army, for its part, said that it destroyed a Harpoon system with a missile in Berezan, in the Odessa region, as well as military units and ammunition depots in the Matviivka district of the Mykolaiv region.

In eastern Ukraine, kyiv expects a new Russian offensive in the Donetsk region — partially controlled since 2014 by pro-Russian separatists — with that of Lugansk, which the Russians claimed to have completely taken over.

Meanwhile, in Moscow, the embassy of the separatist province of Donetsk was inaugurated on Tuesday, in the presence of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

< p class="e-p"> The death toll from the Russian bombardment on Sunday of an apartment building in Chassiv Iar, in the same mining basin, has risen to at least 45 dead, according to the latest Ukrainian relief report.

In Bakhmout, another locality in the Donetsk region, artillery fire was heard Tuesday in an almost deserted city center.

You can't run away from war and you never know where it will find you, simply summed up Lyubov Mozhaeva, a 60-year-old agronomist.

The front is getting closer, notes, resigned, Dmytro Podkuyidko, a town hall official.

In the northeast, in Kharkiv, five people were injured in new shelling, the regional authorities deplored.