Europe
Zelenskyy arrives in Rome for meetings with Pope Francis, Italian leaders
Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelenskyy arrived in Rome on Saturday for talks with Italian officials and Pope Francis, who has said the Vatican has launched a behind-the-scenes initiative to try to end the war launched last year by Russia.
“Today in Rome,″ Zelenskyy tweeted. ”I’m meeting with President of Italy Sergio Mattarella, Prime Minister of Italy @GiorgiaMeloni and the Pope @Pontifex. An important visit for approaching victory of Ukraine! ”
When Zelenskyy arrived at a military airfield at Rome’s Ciampino airport, Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani was on hand to greet him. Tajani told reporters that Italy will continue to support Ukraine “360 degrees" and press for a just peace, one that safeguards Ukraine's independence.
Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni staunchly backs military and other aid for Ukraine.
But while her far-right Brothers of Italy party fiercely champions the principle of national sovereignty, Meloni has had to contend with leaders of two coalition partners who have openly professed for years their admiration for Russian President Vladimir Putin. Coalition ally Silvio Berlusconi, a former premier, has boasted of his friendship with Putin, while another government ally, League leader Matteo Salvini, has questioned the value of economic sanctions against Russia.
The meeting with Mattarella, who is head of state, at the presidential Quirinale Palace was the first official appointment of what is expected to be a visit to the Italian capital lasting several hours.
Zelenskyy is believed to be heading to Berlin next.
Zelenskyy’s exact schedule hadn't been publicly announced because of security concerns, and the Vatican only confirmed a papal meeting shortly before the Ukrainian president's plane touched down.
Italian state radio reported that as part of protective measures, a no-fly zone was ordered for Rome skies and police sharpshooters were strategically placed on high buildings.
Meloni met with Zelenskyy in Kyiv, shortly before the anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion on Feb. 24, 2022.
Francis, who is eager for peace, last met with the Ukrainian leader in 2020.
The pontiff makes frequent impassioned pleas on behalf of Ukraine's “martyred" people, in his words.
At the end of April, flying back to Rome from a trip to Hungary, Francis told reporters on the plane that the Vatican was involved in a behind-the-scene peace mission but gave no details. Neither Russia nor Ukraine has confirmed such an initiative.
He has said he would like to go to Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, if such a visit could be coupled with one to Moscow, if a papal pilgrimage could further the cause of peace.
Last month, Ukraine's prime minister met with Francis at the Vatican and said he asked the pontiff to help Ukraine get back children illegally taken to Russia during the invasion.
The German government, meanwhile, said it was providing Ukraine with additional military aid worth more than 2.7 billion euros ($3 billion), including tanks, anti-aircraft systems and ammunition.
The announcement Saturday came as preparations were underway in Berlin for a possible first visit to Germany by Zelenskyy since Russia invaded his country last year.
Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said Berlin wants to show with the latest package of arms “that Germany is serious in its support” for Ukraine.
“Germany will provide all the help it can, as long as it takes,” he said.
OTHER DEVELOPMENTS:
— A “massive” Russian barrage overnight damaged an energy facility in Ukraine’s western Khmelnytskyi region, the Ukrainian energy ministry said Saturday morning. It added that power supply in the region wasn't affected. The mayor of the regional capital said that 11 civilians were wounded or injured overnight as a result of a Russian missile strike, He added that “hundreds” of residential buildings in the city were also damaged in the strike.
— Russian forces on Friday and overnight resumed their shelling of Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region, killing a civilian, local Gov. Oleh Syniehubov reported on Telegram on Saturday. Four civilians were killed over the same period in Ukraine’s front-line Donetsk province in the east, its Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko said Saturday.
— Russian forces overnight launched at least 21 Iranian-made Shahed drones at Ukrainian territory, 17 of which were shot down, Ukraine's air force said Saturday. One of the drones hit unspecified “infrastructure facilities” in the western Khmelnytskyi region, the update said in a likely reference to the energy facility in the province that was damaged in the nightly strike, according to Ukraine’s energy ministry.
— Russian shelling overnight wounded three civilians in the southern Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv, the mayor said Saturday. One person was hospitalized, while the two others were treated on the spot. Multiple fires were reported within the city.
Emirates to create $200mn fund for reducing fossil fuel use in commercial aviation
Long-haul carrier Emirates said Thursday it would create a $200 million fund for research and development projects aimed at reducing the use of fossil fuels in commercial aviation.
Emirates made the announcement ahead of releasing their annual report for 2022.
The airline, owned by Dubai's government, said the funding would be distributed over three years.
“It’s clear that with the current pathways available to airlines in terms of emissions reduction, our industry won’t be able to hit net zero targets in the prescribed timeline,” airline President Tim Clark said in a statement. “We believe our industry needs better solutions, and that’s why we’re looking to partner with leading organizations."
Emirates separately will aim to use so-called sustainable aviation fuel as well when possible — though it remains incredibly scarce in the market. In January, the airline successfully flew a Boeing 777 on a test flight with one of its two engines entirely powered by the fuel.
The announcement also comes ahead of Dubai hosting the COP28 climate talks in November.
First baby born from 3 people's DNA in UK
For the first time in the UK, a baby was born using three people's DNA, according to the fertility regulator.
The majority of the DNA comes from the baby’s two parents, with only 0.1% coming from a third, donor woman, reports BBC.
The ground-breaking technology aims to prevent infants from being born with catastrophic mitochondrial disorders.
There have been less than five such births, but no additional information has been given, the BBC report said.
Mitochondrial disorders are deadly and can occur within days or even hours of birth. Some families have lost several children, and this procedure is viewed as their sole hope of having a healthy child of their own.
Mitochondria are small compartments found within almost every cell that turn food into usable energy.
Defective mitochondria fail to provide energy to the body, resulting in brain damage, muscle atrophy, heart failure, and blindness, the report added.
They are only passed on by the mother. So mitochondrial donation therapy is a modified kind of IVF in which mitochondria from a healthy donor egg are used.
This donor DNA is solely important for producing functional mitochondria; it has no influence on other features like appearance, therefore thus does not constitute a "third parent."
The procedure was pioneered in Newcastle, and in 2015, rules were passed in the United Kingdom to allow the development of such newborns, it said.
However, the UK did not proceed immediately. In 2016, the first baby delivered using this procedure was to a Jordanian family receiving treatment in the United States.Prof Robin Lovell-Badge, from the Francis Crick Research Institute, said: "It will be interesting to know how well the mitochondrial replacement therapy technique worked at a practical level, whether the babies are free of mitochondrial disease, and whether there is any risk of them developing problems later in life."
Ukraine's occupied nuke plant faces possible staffing crunch
Russia plans to relocate around 2,700 Ukrainian staff from Europe’s largest nuclear plant, Ukraine’s atomic energy company claimed Wednesday, warning of a potential “catastrophic lack of qualified personnel” at the Zaporizhzhia facility in Russia-occupied southern Ukraine.
Workers who signed employment contracts with Russia’s nuclear agency Rosatom following Moscow’s capture of the Zaporizhzhia plant early in the war are set to be taken to Russia along with their families, Energoatom said in a Telegram post.
Energoatom did not specify whether the employees would be forcibly moved out of the plant nor was it immediately possible to verify Energoatom’s claims about Moscow’s plan.
Removing staff would “exacerbate the already extremely urgent issue” of staff shortages, Energoatom said.
The Moscow-installed governor of the region ordered civilian evacuations from the area last Saturday, including from the nearby city of Enerhodar where most plant workers live. The full scope of the evacuation order was not clear.
Fighting near the plant has fueled fears of a potential catastrophic incident like the one at Chernobyl, in northern Ukraine, where a reactor exploded in 1986 and spewed deadly radiation, contaminating a vast area in the world’s worst nuclear accident.
Zaporizhzhia is one of the 10 biggest nuclear plants in the world. While its six reactors have been shut down for months, it still needs power and qualified staff to operate crucial cooling systems and other safety features.
Kremlin-installed authorities in the Zaporizhzhia region are accelerating their push to relocate local residents, including families of workers at the plant, due to an expected Ukrainian counteroffensive, Kyiv officials said.
Military analysts say Ukraine may focus the counteroffensive on the Zaporizhzhia region, trying to split Russian forces in two by pushing through to the Azov Sea coast in the south.
Relatives of Zaporizhzhia plant staff who agreed to relocate were taken to Russia’s southern Rostov region and placed in temporary camps, the Ukrainian General Staff said.
It added that plant employees are currently prohibited from leaving Enerhodar. It made no mention of the alleged Russian plan referred to by Energoatom.
Ukraine's National Resistance Center, which says it runs and coordinates Ukrainian partisan movements on territory occupied by Russian forces, says Russian-installed officials in Zaporizhzhia are shutting down schools, preparing buses and appointing officials to oversee the evacuation process.
They allege that the process is largely targeting children.
The International Criminal Court in March issued an arrest warrant for Russian leader Vladimir Putin for war crimes, accusing him and Russia’s children’s ombudsperson of personal responsibility for the abductions of minors from Ukraine.
At the time, Ukraine’s human rights chief Dmytro Lubinets said that 16,226 Ukrainian children had been forcibly taken to Russia, citing data from Ukraine’s National Information Bureau.
After taking over at Zaporizhzhia, the Russians left the Ukrainian staff in place to keep the plant running but the exact number of workers currently at the plant is not known. The United Nations’ nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, did not immediately reply to an Associated Press query about the staffing level.
However, the IAEA said soon after Russian troops overran the plant after invading Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, that low staffing levels “seriously compromised” one of the fundamental factors in nuclear safety and security, which is that “operating staff must be able to fulfil their safety and security duties and have the capacity to make decisions free of undue pressure.”
The IAEA has deployed a handful of staff at Zaporizhzhia in an effort to ensure its safety.
German chancellor, state officials meet for migration summit
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has invited top officials of the country's 16 states for a summit Wednesday on the growing number of asylum-seekers and the lack of housing and spaces in schools or kindergartens for them.
The federal government and the states have been arguing for months over who gets to pay for the rising costs.
In addition to the more than 1 million Ukrainians who came to Germany last year looking for shelter from Russia's war on their country, the number of asylum-seekers is also up steeply. Ukrainians receive refugee status in Germany immediately and don’t need to apply for asylum.
In 2022, more than 244,000 people applied for asylum in Germany. In the first four months of this year, 101,981 people applied for asylum — an increase of 78% compared with the previous year, according to the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees. Experts estimate that up to 300,000 migrants could apply for asylum in Germany this year.
Many of those now arriving in Germany on a daily basis trek across the Balkan s and come from war-ridden countries such as Syria or Afghanistan. They rely on smugglers to take them across the borders so they can ask for asylum the moment they arrive on German soil.
Local communities — which are represented by the states at Wednesday's migration summit — have been putting up asylum-seekers in tents, containers, gyms or former airports for months as regular housing gets scarce. In addition, they say there's also a lack of kindergarten and school spaces for migrant children. They demand billions in additional federal funds to cover their costs.
The national government, however, rejects their demands, saying it spent 28 billion euros ($30.7 billion) on migration last year alone. More than 12 billion euros were invested in combating the causes of flight abroad, and around 15 billion were provided for direct relief to the states and local authorities, German news agency dpa reported.
For this year, the government says it will give 15.6 billion euros in federal support to the states and communities to help support their costs for migration — which the states claim is still not enough.
While the migration level of 2015-16, in which more than 1 million people applied for asylum in Germany, has not been yet reached, officials fear that the growing number of migrants could also lead to a re-strengthening of far-right parties trying to exploit anti-migrant sentiment for their own populist purposes.
There have been calls to reinstate border controls in Germany, which usually does not control its outer borders as it is a member of the visa-free Schengen travel zone. Scholz himself said earlier this year that Germany needs to do a better job curbing illegal migration and deporting those whose asylum bids get rejected. Germany has repeatedly reintroduced checks along its southern border with Austria in an effort to clamp down on migration. Austria in return, reinstated controls on its border with Slovakia to keep migrants from entering without authorization.
Beyond Germany, there’s also growing concern that the arrival of migrants throughout Europe is getting out of control and that a joint European solution needs to be found.
Some top officials, including German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser, support plans to establish transit camps for migrants at Europe’s outer borders where officials can decide on asylum bids — and deport those who are rejected before they can even travel to popular destinations such as Germany, Britain or Scandinavia.
“For too long, we have made it difficult for people to come to Germany who we need as bright minds and hardworking hands," German Finance Minister Christian Lindner said Tuesday on ZDF public television. "And for too long we have made it easy for people to stay who are actually obliged to leave because they entered Germany irregularly. And that has to change.”
Journalist working for AFP news agency killed in Ukraine
French international news agency Agence France-Presse says its Ukraine video coordinator was killed Tuesday during a rocket attack near the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut.
In a tweet, AFP said other agency journalists were with Arman Soldin at the time of the Grad rocket bombardment.
French media outlets reported that the late afternoon attack took place in the vicinity of Chasiv Yar, a town near Bakhmut. Russian forces have been trying to capture the city for nine months, making Bakhmut the focus of the war's longest battle.
Soldin was 32 years old and born in Sarajevo, now the capital of Bosnia, according to the French media reports.
AFP said it was “devastated” at Soldin's death and “all of our thoughts go out to his family and loved ones.”
In May 2022, French journalist Frederic Leclerc-Imhoff, who was working in Ukraine for BFM-TV, was killed near Severodonetsk in the east.
Arrested over protesting King Charles’ coronation: Group says will take legal action
An anti-monarchy group says it plans to take legal action against London’s Metropolitan Police after several of its members were arrested as they prepared to protest the coronation of King Charles III.
Civil liberties groups are accusing the police, and Britain’s Conservative government, of stifling the right to protest with new powers to clamp down on peaceful but disruptive demonstrations.
The police force expressed “regret” late Monday that the activists were prevented from protesting, but defended its handling of the coronation, which drew hundreds of thousands of people into the streets of London — hundreds of protesters among them.
Police arrested 64 people around Saturday’s coronation, most for allegedly planning to disrupt the ceremonies. Four have been charged, most have been released on bail, and six members of anti-monarchist group Republic have been freed and told they will not face any charges.
Republic chief executive Graham Smith said three senior police officers had come to his house and apologized in person for the arrest that saw him held in custody for 16 hours.
“I said for the record I won’t accept the apology,” Smith said, adding that the group “will be taking action.”
The U.K.’s recently passed Public Order Act, introduced in response to civil disobedience by environmental groups, allows police to search demonstrators for items including locks and glue and imposes penalties of up to 12 months in prison for protesters who block roads or interfere with “national infrastructure.”
Police said the Republic members had items that could be used to “lock on” to infrastructure. Republic said the items were ties for their placards and police acknowledged its “investigation has been unable to prove intent to use them to lock on and disrupt the event.”
“We regret that those six people arrested were unable to join the wider group of protesters in Trafalgar Square and elsewhere on the procession route,” police said.
The Conservative government defended police handling of the protests, London Mayor Sadiq Khan, a member of the Labour Party, requested “further clarity” from the force. He said the right to peaceful protest is an integral part of democracy.
Conservative lawmaker David Davis said the new powers of arrest were too broad.
“No-one wants a day ruined, but the right to put up placards is virtually absolute in British democracy,” he told the BBC on Tuesday.
The Metropolitan Police force is already under intense pressure after a series of scandals involving its treatment of women and minorities. Confidence in the force plummeted after a serving officer raped and killed a young woman in London in 2020.
An independent review commissioned after the murder said the force was riddled with racism, misogyny and homophobia.
End/UNB/AP/MB
EU, Ukraine together on Europe Day, but Kyiv remains outside
For the first time, Ukraine and the European Union are marking Europe Day, that celebration of “peace and unity,” together. Don’t let anyone be fooled too much, though.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, the head of the EU's executive branch, made a special trip to Kyiv on Tuesday to deliver the warm words of common destiny after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that his nation would from now on “celebrate Europe Day together with all of free Europe."
More than a year into the war with invading Russia, Ukraine wants to badly join the bloc as an essential part to anchor its future in the Western world. “Europe Day,” when the 27 current members celebrate their bond as one, also shows how far that moment is still off.
Also Read: Putin tells Red Square parade ‘real war’ unleashed on Russia
Next month, it will be one year already since the EU nations granted Ukraine candidate status, lavished the nation with praise, boosted it with aid and military support and sanctioned Kyiv’s enemy Russia with ever more sanctions. Some leaders often dress in the blue and yellow of Ukraine’s national flag and “Slava Ukraini,” which means Glory to Ukraine, ends all so many EU speeches.
Yet, frustration on the Ukraine side is evident, because the beginning of membership negotiations is still out of sight. Weary and hoarse, dressed in army olive-drab, Zelenskyy visited the Netherlands last week with a heartfelt plea for a “positive assessment” to start the talks.
“We do all our best during the war. We do all the reforms what we have to do,” he told the host, one of the original six EU members dating back to 1958.
Time, however, is an extremely flexible concept in the EU, and patience an essential one.
Also Read: Ukraine’s Zelenskyy convinced Putin will face court justice
“I am absolutely impressed by what the president’s team is doing,” Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said, with Zelenskyy standing beside him. “Fighting a war against Russia and at the same time making concrete steps in terms of clearing the way in terms of this whole process towards EU accession.”
Then he fell back on the time-set mechanics of the EU, which foresees the next assessment in about a half-year, in October. All this to a leader who is counting in weeks and months when his nation might be on the road to victory — or ruin.
The best advice, though, is for Ukraine to stay the course.
“A promise has been made and in essence it is now in the hands of Ukraine. The EU cannot postpone things forever,” said Ghent University Professor Hendrik Vos, an expert on EU decision making.
But unexpected things can happen, as suddenly overflowing cereal silos in several eastern EU nations proved early this spring. To help Ukraine export its grain, sunflower and other farm produce after Russia closed off the Black Sea route, the EU lifted trade restrictions to give a free passage through the bloc and hopefully on to needy world markets.
Yet in neighboring nations like Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and Romania, stocks built up, prices plummeted and that extremely vocal and influential group of voters — the EU’s 10 million farmers — started grumbling, indicating that membership promises are about much more than just sentimental shows of support.
“Of course we have solidarity with Ukraine,” said Christine Lambert, the president of the COPA EU farmers union, “but there are also significant economic aspects to this,” adding that “it’s sort of creating a hole in our budget. It will result in problems and farmers can’t bear these problems alone.”
Apart from making sure that France and Germany never go to war again, the founding principles of the EU also included avoiding hunger in the bloc in the wake of World War II. It allowed farming to take on an exceptionally important role in EU policies and even now it takes up almost a third of the EU’s designated budget.
The war and climate change have put EU farmers increasingly in a squeeze and taking in — and on — a nation like Ukraine, which is historically seen as the breadbasket of Europe, would be especially challenging.
Before the war, Ukraine still had a major stake in the global market of wheat, barley, corn and sunflower oil. Farming accounted for more than 40% of exports.
Opening up to such competition strikes fear in the hearts of many farmers, especially if it comes within a few years. Lambert pointed out how EU farmers need to meet tough environmental and social rules, which Ukrainians so far don't have to comply with.
Once Ukraine joins, it will in principle have the whole market of the current 27 nations at its disposal, but it will also need to abide by EU rules. And Vos said that goes right down to the size of chicken battery cages to meet animal welfare standards.
“Farmers will be saying they don’t want unfair competition from big Ukraine chicken farms that don’t have to play by the rules,” Vos said.
And Ukraine will only be able to join if it gets major financial aid from the current members to rebuild its nation and upgrade to EU standards. It will turn many of the EU nations that now get money from EU coffers into net contributors. Little wonder many in the EU push any membership date into the unspecified future yonder.
“Many years. We’ll need that time to see that obligations are satisfied,” Lambert said.
Such considerations from a small group of stakeholders won’t stop the groundswell of history though. In the EU’s successive sweeps of expansion, short-term financial losses never stood in the way in the end.
When the Iberian Peninsula wrested itself free from dictatorship during the 1970s, poor and needy Spain and Portugal were embraced in the EU a decade later despite the cost.
When the Berlin Wall came down and the Soviet Union collapsed in the early 1990s, the EU took in eight eastern nations in 2004, also at a major cost to the existing members.
Each time, talks on nitty gritty issues went on deep into countless nights but eventually compromises were found — more money was given to grumbling members, sometimes long transition times imposed.
Russia's war in Ukraine could well be an equal watershed in EU history.
“At a certain point there is no way back. The groundbreaking decision has been taken. There can be incremental talks about money until the end. But they won’t stop it,” Vos said.
Ukraine farmers risk losing their lives or livelihoods
A grassy lane rutted with tire tracks leads to Volodymyr Zaiets’ farm in southern Ukraine. He is careful, driving only within those shallow grooves — veering away might cost him his life in the field dotted with explosive mines.
Weeds grow tall where rows of sunflowers once bloomed. Zaiets’ land hasn't been touched since the fall of 2021, when it was last seeded with wheat. Now, it's a minefield left by retreating Russian forces.
Zaiets eschewed official warnings and demined this patch of land himself, determined not to lose the year’s harvest. He expects that 15% of his 1,600 hectares (4,000 acres) of farmland was salvaged.
Workers like Victor Kostiuk still spot mines, but he's ready to start the tractor.
“We have to do it,” he says, “Why be afraid?”
Across Ukraine, the war has forced grain growers into a vicious dilemma. Farmers in areas now free from Russian occupation are risking their lives to strip their land of explosives before the critical spring planting season. Even then, they must cope with soaring production and transportation costs caused by Russia’s blockade of many Black Sea ports and recent restrictions that neighboring countries imposed on Ukrainian grain.
The dual crisis is causing many farmers to cut back on sowing crops. Bottlenecks in shipping grain by land and sea are creating losses, with expectations of a 20% to 30% reduction in grain output, poorer quality crops and potentially thousands of bankruptcies next year, according to industry insiders, Ukrainian government officials and international organizations.
The “drastic reduction” of grain crops potentially threatens global food security, said Pierre Vauthier, head of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization in Ukraine. “That is the main thing everybody eats. So that’s why it is a big concern.”
More than a year since Russia's invasion, the Ukrainian agriculture industry is starting to see the full impact of what's been dubbed “ the breadbasket of the world,” whose affordable supplies of wheat, barley and sunflower oil are crucial to Africa, the Middle East and parts of Asia where people are going hungry.
The FAO says 90% of agricultural businesses lost revenue and 12% reported lands contaminated with mines. Land planted with grain dropped last year to 11.6 million hectares (28.6 million acres) from 16 million hectares (around 40 million acres) in 2021. That's expected to fall to 10.2 million hectares (25.2 million acres) this year.
In the southern Kherson province, between the threat of missiles from the sky and mines on the ground, farmers make the same, often tragic, calculation: Take the risk and plant or lose their livelihoods.
The region is among the highest wheat-producing areas in Ukraine and the most heavily mined. Demining services are overstretched, with infrastructure and civilian homes prioritized over farms.
But growers can’t wait: April and May are key planting months for corn, the autumn months for wheat. Many are switching to planting oil seeds that are less costly.
“We have nearly 40 big farmers in our area, and nearly everyone is unable to access their lands except two,” said Hanna Shostak-Kuchmiak, head of the Vysokopillya administration that includes several villages in northern Kherson.
Zaiets is one, and Valerii Shkuropat from the nearby village of Ivanivka is the other.
“Our heroes,” said Shostak-Kuchmiak, “who were driving their cars around picking up mines and bringing them to our deminers.”
Neither farmer felt they had the choice. Both knew that without a harvest this year, they will be insolvent by next.
Everyone understands the risks, said Shkuropat, who’s vast 2,500 hectares (more than 6,000 acres) of land once grew peas, barley, millet and sunflowers. He estimates that half can be planted.
Last month, one of his workers was killed and another was wounded while picking up metal missile remnants.
“If we sow, if we grow crops, people will have jobs, salaries and they will have a means to feed their families,” Shkuropat said. “But if we don’t do anything, we will have nothing.”
Russia’s blockade of Ukraine’s Black Sea ports stripped the country of the advantage it once enjoyed over other grain-exporting countries. Transit costs, now four to six times higher than prewar levels, have rendered grain production prohibitively expensive.
High costs of fuel, fertilizer and quality seeds only add to farmers' woes. Most must sell their grain at a loss.
Farmers are responding by seeding less, said Andrii Vadaturskyi, CEO of Nibulon, a top Ukrainian grain shipping company.
“No one is paying attention to the fact that already 40% less wheat has been seeded (this year), and we expect 50% less corn will be seeded in Ukraine,” he said, drawing on data from 3,000 farmers.
Nibulon once paid an average of $12 to ship a ton of grain from the southern port city of Odesa. Now it pays $80-$100 per ton, Vadaturskyi said,
HarvEast CEO Dmytro Skornyakov said that his agricultural company pays almost $110 in logistics costs to export every ton of corn.
“It covers our expenses, but doesn’t give us any profit,” he said.
Negotiations are underway on renewing the U.N.-brokered agreement that allows Ukrainian grain to safely leave three Black Sea ports. Shippers say the deal isn't working efficiently.
Russian inspections are causing long wait times for vessels, piling on fees and making the sea route expensive and unreliable, Ukrainian grain shippers say. Russia denies slowing inspections.
“We had some vessels which were waiting close to 80 days in the queue simply to be loaded,” said Vadaturskyi of Nibulon. “Someone has to lose that money, either the buyer, owner of the vessel or trader.”
Transit routes through Europe are open even as Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Bulgaria and Hungary temporarily banned Ukrainian wheat, corn and some other products over concerns about their own farmers' profits.
But those routes are slow and costly. Shipping by sea accounted for 75% of Ukrainian grain exports at the start of the year.
Meanwhile, some farmers won't risk planting their fields.
Oleh Uskhalo’s land in Potomkyne is awash with ammunition, the vast wheat farms reduced to a graveyard of scorched equipment.
Inside a bombed-out grain shed lies piles of wheat grain — Ushkalo’s entire prewar harvest — rotting under the sun.
“We can go on for another year,” he said. After that, he doesn’t know. He hopes for government compensation.
“I cannot send (my workers) to a field where I know mines and bombs are,” Uskhalo said. “To send a person to blow themselves up? I can’t do that.”
He faces resistance from his employees, eager to earn wages.
“The tractor drivers, they say, ‘We can go, we can sign a document stating that we take full responsibility,’” Uskhalo said.
It’s too risky, he told them.
In the distance, he can see a tractor equipped with disk tillers, a type of plow. “I wonder if it’s Volodymyr Mykolaiovych,” he said, referring to Zaiets.
“All it takes is for one of those disks to hit a mine and that’s it.”
That’s what happened to Mykola Ozarianskyi.
In April, the farmer took a chance: He hopped on his tractor in his village of Borozenske, in Kherson, to head to a friend’s sunflower field to cut stalks.
He swerved to turn down a side farm road. He remembers the explosion, then waking up in a hospital bed with a collapsed lung and broken ribs.
Every day, he thinks of his 16 hectares (around 40 acres) of land, still unseeded.
“I will do it,” he said, straining to speak while a tube drains blood from his chest. “For a farmer, not planting means death.”
Burials held in Serbia for some victims of mass shootings
Heart-wrenching cries echoed as funerals were held in Serbia on Saturday for some of the victims of two mass shootings that happened just a day apart this week, leaving 17 people dead and 21 wounded, many of them children.
The shootings on Wednesday in a school in Belgrade and on Thursday in a rural area south of the capital city have left the nation stunned with grief and disbelief.
Though Serbia is awash with weapons and no stranger to crisis situations following the wars of the 1990s, a school shooting like the one on Wednesday has never happened before. The most recent previous mass shooting was in 2013 when a war veteran killed 13 people.
The shooter on Wednesday was a 13-year-old boy who opened fire on his fellow students, killing seven girls, a boy and a school guard. A day later, a 20-year-old man fired randomly in two villages in central Serbia, killing eight people.
Classmates and hundreds of other people cried unconsolably as one of the girls killed in the school shooting was laid to rest in Belgrade in a small white coffin that was covered with heaps of flowers. Overwhelmed by grief, the girl's mother could barely stand on her feet. One girl collapsed during the service amid screams and sobbing.
While the country struggled to come to terms with what happened, authorities promised a gun crackdown and said they would boost security in schools. Thousands lit candles and left flowers near the shooting site in Belgrade, in an outpouring of sadness and solidarity.
“My soul aches for them,” said Vesna Kostic, who came to pay respect outside the school on Saturday. “I keep looking for a cause, a reason why this has happened to him (the shooter), why this has happened to us.”
Serbian media reported that four of the eight children killed in the school shooting, as well as the Vladislav Ribnikar school guard, would be buried at cemeteries in Belgrade on Saturday, the second day of a three-day mourning period for the victims.
Some 50 kilometers (30 miles) to the south, a mass funeral service was being held in the small village of Malo Orasje for five young men who were gunned down in the shooting rampage on Thursday evening.
Sobbing mourners lined up to light candles while waiting for the coffins to be placed on five benches outside the village church for a service.
“Five graves! He (the killer) shut down five families,” one villager told N1 television. “How could this happen?”
Serbian police have said that the suspected shooter stopped a taxi after his rampage and made the driver to take him to a village further south, where he was arrested on Friday. Officers later said they found weapons and ammunition in two houses he was using there.
The suspect, identified as Uros Blazic, was questioned by prosecutors in the central town of Smederevo on Saturday, state media reported. He faces charges of first-degree murder and unauthorized possession of guns and ammunition.
The motive for both shootings remained unclear. The 13-year-old boy, who is too young to be criminally charged, has been placed in a mental clinic. His father was arrested for allegedly teaching his son to use guns and not securing his weapons well enough.
The suspected village shooter wore a pro-Nazi T-shirt, authorities said, and complained of “disparagement,” though it was unclear what he meant. Populist leader Aleksandar Vucic promised the “monsters” will “never see the light of day again.”
The wounded in the two shootings have been hospitalized and most have undergone complicated surgical procedures. A girl and a boy from the school shootings remain in serious condition, and the village victims are stable but under constant observation.
The school shooting left six children and a teacher wounded, while 14 people were wounded in the villages of Malo Orasje and Dubona. The dead in Dubona included a young, off-duty policeman and his sister.
Authorities released a photo showing the suspected shooter upon arrest — a young man in a police car in a blue T-shirt with the slogan “Generation 88” on it. The double eights are often used as shorthand for “Heil Hitler” since H is the eighth letter of the alphabet.
Apart from the gun crackdown, officials have announced stepped-up monitoring of social networks and the media. Already by Saturday, several people had been questioned for posting threats or videos supporting the killers on social networks, the Tanjug news agency reported.
Serbia's education ministry outlined a crisis plan for the students of Vladislav Ribnikar school to gradually return to classes next Wednesday. A team of experts, backed the U.N. children's agency UNICEF, will offer support and oversee the process, a ministry statement said.
Experts have repeatedly warned that decades of crises and economic hardship, coupled with corrupt institutions and a high level of intolerance in public speech and politics, could push some people over the edge.
The populist-led Balkan country has refused to fully face its role in the wars of the 1990s, war criminals are largely regarded as heroes and minority groups routinely face harassment and sometimes physical violence.
“The question now is whether our society is ready to reject the model of violence,” psychologist Zarko Korac warned. “When you glorify a war criminal you glorify his crimes and you send a message that it is legitimate.”