Main points
- Turkey received the Irtysh vessel with about 33 thousand tons of wheat exported from the occupied territories of Ukraine.
- The grain was loaded in Sevastopol with forged documents to hide its origin and avoid sanctions.
Turkey accepted stolen grain / Photo vesseltracker.com
A ship carrying wheat that could have been exported from the occupied territories of Ukraine has arrived in the Turkish port of Samsun. It involves tens of thousands of tons of grain and a scheme involving forged documents.
How is grain exported from the occupied territories?
The bulk carrier Irtysh delivered about 33,000 tons of wheat to the port of Samsun in Turkey, Ukrainian Shipping Magazine reports. According to investigators, the grain was taken from the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine.
As Kateryna Yaresko, a journalist for the SeaKrime project of the Myrotvorets Center, told us, the ship was loaded in Sevastopol at the Avlita grain terminal between April 10 and 15. After that, it headed to the Kavkaz port area, where the documents were reissued.
According to the journalist, this practice is used to hide the origin of the cargo. Formally, the documents are changed, but in fact the grain was loaded in occupied Crimea, which makes these operations illegal.
Fake documents and ship itineraries
Experts emphasize that reissuing documents in neutral ports is a typical scheme for legalizing stolen Ukrainian grain. This allows you to hide the real route and avoid sanctions or inspections.
It is known that the exporter is the Zernoexport company. Previously, the ship had already made voyages between occupied Sevastopol and the ports of Djibouti and Salif in Yemen, which may indicate an established supply channel.
Such cases once again raise the issue of control over the origin of agricultural products on international markets and the risks to the reputation of global grain trade.
“Unfortunately, it's too late”: journalist talks about the situation with Israel and Ukrainian grain from TOT
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The Israeli Foreign Minister reported that a ship with Ukrainian grain that was entering Israel has already left the port of Haifa.
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The vessel “ABINSK” received permission to unload in Israel, despite information about stolen grain from the occupied territories.