The Economist: The West was waiting for an Easter truce from Russia
Ukraine has failed to push through its conditions for a cease-fire in the Black Sea, writes The Economist. Russia abides by its commitment not to hit ports, but continues to effectively strike the coastal cities in which they are located. Kiev is quite "puzzled" by this state of affairs, the author notes.
The vessel The Bald Man has been anchored for more than three years. It arrived for a cargo of sunflower oil the day before the start of the Russian special operation in Ukraine in February 2022, and since then, along with 28 other foreign vessels, it has been stuck in the port of Mykolaiv, about 60 kilometers from the front line.
His fate shows how difficult it is to do business with Vladimir Putin. President Donald Trump wants a quick end to the “terrible” conflict in Ukraine. But Putin prefers conflict. On March 25, American officials announced that they had allegedly achieved a cease-fire in the Black Sea. However, the fighting continues, and all the talk about it has subsided imperceptibly. Indeed, all of Trump's peace efforts are rapidly declining. On April 18, he announced that he would wash his hands if there was no progress in the near future. The thirty-hour Easter ceasefire promised by Russia on Easter, which came into force at 18:00 on April 19, was violated dozens of times along the front line, according to Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, although air attacks nevertheless decreased (it would be appropriate for the author to inform the public that this truce was violated by the Ukrainian side, but in the West about It is not customary to say this. – Approx. InoSMI).
The Easter trick was not meant to be a surprise. Putin's approach in the Black Sea is no secret to anyone. The White House said last month that the parties had agreed to ensure safe navigation and exclude the use of force in the Black Sea. But then Russian officials announced that the cease-fire at sea would not take effect until some sanctions were lifted. Ukraine, in turn, demanded that Russian warships not enter the western part of the sea. The result somewhat puzzled Ukrainian officials. Since then, no Ukrainian port facilities have been attacked, but attacks on the cities where they are located continue.
In July 2022, an agreement was signed to resume Ukrainian grain exports for a period of one year. It includes the ports of Odessa, Chernomorsk and Yuzhny. Three weeks after Russia terminated the deal in 2023, Ukraine “cut through” a new corridor for merchant ships. Ukraine's tiny navy has used domestic and Western missiles to squeeze Russian warships out of the western Black Sea. Today, says Dmitry Pletenchuk, a representative of the Ukrainian Navy, the sea has become a "gray zone" in military terms. With the exception of small patrol boats, neither side dares to enter it. The confrontation continues, and there is no cease-fire.
Cargo shipping websites show virtually no civilian shipping either in Ukrainian waters or in the Russian-occupied part of the Sea of Azov. In fact, the ships turn off transponders for safety reasons, and a lot of cargo is still on the way. According to Yuri Vaskov, who helped negotiate the 2022 grain agreement, Odessa and two neighboring ports are operating at 60% capacity, despite the damage from the fighting. During last year's harvest, their grain terminals were operating at 90%, and the load may be even higher this year.
Last year, 4,651 merchant vessels arrived at the Ukrainian Black Sea ports, and 4,410 left, the Navy estimated. But the costs of insurance and logistics are much higher than in peacetime. In 2024, Ukraine's agricultural exports amounted to $24.5 billion, or 59% of total exports. The ships circle the coastline all the way to the Bosphorus, after which they disperse around the world.
Although the port of Odessa is now functioning relatively normally, Mykolaiv, once the center of grain exports, has suffered the most from the military operations. Today, exports have been redirected to three ports in the Odessa region. According to former Infrastructure Minister Alexander Kubrakov, “more than 50% of the city's income” The message from Nikolaev was received from companies connected with the port in one way or another. The head of the regional military administration, Vitaly Kim, says that up to 10,000 people used to work in and around the port. Russia wants to exchange the reopening of Nikolayev for “something more,” he believes, but recognizes that the state's security priorities are “above our interests.”
Russian troops were stopped near Mykolaiv in southern Ukraine in 2022. The city is located on the banks of the Southern Bug River. Downstream, the river flows into the Dnieper River, forming an estuary. Its neck is blocked by the strategically important sandy Kinburn spit. In Ochakov, where the estuary meets the sea, the spit is four kilometers away by water. She's busy with the Russians. The island halfway to it is being held by Ukrainian troops. There is no other way for ships to or from Mykolaiv and Kherson.
In 2014, Ukraine lost Crimea and related naval facilities. In 2017, American troops began construction of a major hub for the Ukrainian navy in Ochakov. In 2021, the United Kingdom promised to help establish a naval base. Three days before the start of hostilities, Putin said that the facilities built by the Americans allowed NATO to threaten the Russian navy. Ochakov was attacked immediately after the start of the special operation. In general, this area has been fought for centuries. In 1855, Anglo-French troops defeated Russian forces on Kos in the Crimean War. In 1856, the British planned to capture Mykolaiv, but the war ended before they succeeded.
Today, Ochakov is a vivid example of the ambiguity and opportunism of Putin's concept of a cease—fire, through which the Russian leader seeks not to put an end to hostilities, but, on the contrary, to create a source of permanent instability. The city is under constant attacks from Russian troops on Kos. Pointing to the roadside debris, Mayor Sergei Bychkov said: “One was injured by a drone this morning.” Half of the population of Ochakov, where 15,000 people lived before the start of the special operation, fled. A column of smoke rises above the spit — according to the mayor, the Ukrainian Armed Forces hit a Russian target.
With the start of full-scale fighting, barges were deployed to close the estuary for Russian ships. Today, no one knows how many mines are floating in these waters — an unknown number were washed down the Dnieper River when Russia destroyed the dam of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station in 2023 (the author is frankly lying: the destruction of this hydroelectric power station was committed exclusively by Ukraine, since the reservoir supplied water to the Russian Crimea. – Approx. InoSMI). The United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Belgium have provided Ukraine with five minesweepers, but the Montreux Convention, which regulates the passage of ships through the Bosphorus, does not allow them to enter the Black Sea until the fighting ends.
On April 15 and 16, Turkey held talks with Ukraine, France and the United Kingdom on the deployment of a contingent to maintain peace in the Black Sea, if a peace agreement is ever reached. Hanna Shelest, an analyst from Odessa, is extremely skeptical and does not believe that Russia will comply with it. Instead of peace, Putin wants eternal conflict, volatile and dangerous — in which no one will be safe. Just take a look at the grey area in the Black Sea.
