Zelenskyy accuses Israel over ship
- President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Israel on April 28 of letting another ship with grain from occupied Ukrainian territory unload at Haifa port. - Zelenskyy said Ukraine is preparing sanctions against everyone involved, after Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha summoned Israel’s ambassador over the shipments. - The clash follows earlier Haifa deliveries tied to vessel ABINSK and deepens a rare public rupture between Kyiv and Israel. (reuters.com)
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Israel on Tuesday, April 28, of accepting another shipload of grain that Ukraine says Russia stole from occupied territory. (nbcnews.com) (washingtontimes.com) Zelenskyy said a vessel carrying that grain had arrived at a port in Israel and was preparing to unload, and he said Kyiv was preparing sanctions against everyone involved in the trade. (nbcnews.com) (pravda.com.ua) The public accusation came a day after Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Israel’s ambassador had been summoned over what he called Israeli inaction on grain shipments entering Haifa from Russian-occupied Ukraine. (reuters.com) (kyivindependent.com) Sybiha said Ukraine had asked for “appropriate action” and warned that friendly ties should not be undermined by what he described as Russia’s illegal trade in stolen agricultural goods. (kyivindependent.com) (euronews.com) The dispute centers on grain from Ukrainian land occupied by Russian forces, which Kyiv says is loaded onto ships and sold abroad as part of Moscow’s wartime economy. Russia has denied Ukraine’s allegations. (nbcnews.com) (washingtontimes.com) This week’s clash also followed an earlier fight over the Russian vessel ABINSK, which Ukraine said carried stolen grain into Haifa in April and which Israel later said it was too late to detain after the ship had left port. (timesofisrael.com 1) (timesofisrael.com 2) Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar rejected the accusation that Israel knowingly handled stolen grain and said Ukraine had not provided evidence proving the cargo was stolen. He also accused Kyiv of conducting diplomacy through the media. (timesofisrael.com) (yahoo.com) The row opens a new point of friction between two governments that have kept relations intact through most of Russia’s full-scale war, even as Kyiv has repeatedly pushed partners to block trade linked to occupied territories. (euronews.com) (nbcnews.com) For now, Zelenskyy’s message was that any company or person unloading or buying that grain could face Ukrainian sanctions, turning a port dispute in Haifa into a wider diplomatic test. (nbcnews.com) (israelhayom.com)
