The first ship loaded with grain to leave Ukraine since the start of the war with Russia was preparing to cross the Bosphorus strait on Wednesday and sail to Lebanon after being inspected in the Turkish city of Istanbulauthorities reported.

A team of inspectors spent 90 minutes carrying out supervision tasks of the cargo of the Razoni, which carries 26,000 tonnes of grain and was anchored in Istanbul, the Turkish Defense Ministry said.

The team included officials from Ukraine, Russia, Turkey and the UN They are a coordination center in Istanbul set up as part of an agreement signed last month to resume Ukrainian grain exports stalled by war.

The inspections aim to ensure that ships heading to Ukraine are not carrying weapons and those leaving are carrying only grain.

The agreement provides for ships leaving three Ukrainian Black Sea ports to use safe corridors to the Mediterranean Sea via the Bosphorus Strait or the Istanbul Strait, which separates the two seas.

The Razoni sounded its siren after inspectors abandoned shipreported the AFP news agency.

Footage tweeted by the Turkish Defense Ministry showed an inspector approaching a shipping container to touch grain. The Razoni left the Ukrainian port of Odessa on Monday bound for Lebanon.

Ukraine’s infrastructure ministry confirmed that the ship had passed inspection, adding that 17 more “are loaded and awaiting clearance to depart.”

The inspectors, some of whom wore white helmets, traveled to the Razoni in the rain in two boats escorted by the Turkish Coast Guard. The Turkish press estimated the inspectors at twenty.

The inspections aim to ensure that ships heading to Ukraine do not carry weapons and that those leaving carry only grain, fertilizers or food products of agricultural origin, but no other raw materials .

Russia has said it wants to control the region in eastern Ukraine called Donbass and all of southern Ukraine.

The UN and Turkey, which brokered the signing of separate agreements with Russia and Ukraine on July 22, say resuming such exports will help ease a growing food crisis. and global inflation caused by war.

Ukraine and Russia are two of the biggest exporters of wheat, barley and sunflower.

Its exit from world markets due to armed conflict has caused grain shortages and a sharp rise in food prices that threaten the political stability of net food-importing developing countries.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has also disrupted Western Europe’s energy supply, after Moscow cut gas supplies to countries that imposed sanctions on it, which fear a complete cut in shipments.

Fears are particularly strong in Germany, one of the countries most dependent on Russian gas, which gets there directly through a pipeline called Nord Stream that runs from Siberia and passes under the Baltic Sea.

From Berlin, the head of the German government, Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz, accused Russia of blocking the delivery of a turbine necessary for the normal operation of the Nord Stream.

“There is no reason the delivery should not take place,” Scholz said, adding that Russia only needed to provide the necessary customs information for the transport of the turbine.

The turbine was repaired in Canada, whose government agreed to return it to Russia despite violating sanctions the West imposed on Moscow for invading Ukraine. The only government that complained about Canada’s decision was the Ukrainian.

As, Russian forces continued to shell Ukraine, hitting the southern town of Mikolaiv in particular.

The governor of the province of the same name said Russian attacks launched in the past 24 hours hit the city twice, at 9 p.m. yesterday and 5 a.m. today.

Russia has said it wants to control the region in eastern Ukraine called Donbass and all of southern Ukraine.

The shelling damaged a pier, an industrial enterprise, residential buildings, a garage, a supermarket and a pharmacy, Governor Vitaly Klim said in a Telegram app.

It was unclear if there were any casualties.

Russia has said it wants to control the eastern region of Ukraine called Donbass and all of southern Ukraine, which would include Odessa and cut off all Ukrainian access to the Black Sea.

Amid continuous Russian attacks, The Ukrainian government began Tuesday the evacuation of more than 200,000 civilians who are still in the province of Donetsk.one of the two that make up Donbass, where Russia is waging a major offensive.

Russian troops already control half of Donetsk and all of Lugansk – the other province that makes up Donbass – thanks to their offensive launched in April, two months after the start of the invasion of Ukraine.