After the attack provoked outrage from Ukraine's allies, Russia claimed on Sunday (July 24) that its missile barrage on a Ukrainian port crucial to a historic grain export deal had destroyed Western-supplied weapons.
On his first stop in Egypt during a tour to several African nations, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov sought to reassure his Egyptian counterpart Sameh Shoukry that Russian food deliveries would continue.
Only one day after the warring parties reached an agreement to free exports from the facility, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy described Saturday's attack on the Odesa port as "Russian barbarism."
After the two cruise missile strikes, Turkey, which assisted in negotiating the agreement, claimed to have gotten guarantees from Moscow that no Russian forces were involved.
On Sunday, however, Russia's defense ministry reversed course and admitted that the strikes had in fact damaged a Ukrainian military ship and some US-delivered weapons.
"High-precision, long-range missiles launched from the sea destroyed a docked Ukrainian warship and a stockpile of anti-ship missiles delivered by the United States to the Kyiv regime," it said. "A Ukrainian army repair and upgrade plant has also been put out of order."
The strikes have placed doubt on the historic agreement to alleviate a worldwide food crisis, which was hashed out over months of negotiations and signed in Istanbul.
On Russian grain commitment, due to a drop in exports, cereal prices in Africa-the world's poorest continent where food supplies are acutely scarce-rose sharply. Lavrov assured Shoukry that Russia would fulfill grain orders while on the tour, which also includes stops in Uganda, Ethiopia, and Congo-Brazzaville. "We confirmed the commitment of Russian exporters of cereal products to meet their orders in full," in a press conference he said.
Zelenskyy claimed that the attacks on Odesa demonstrated that Moscow could not be relied upon to uphold its commitments and that engagement with Moscow was becoming more and more impossible.
Odesa is one of three designated export hubs under the agreement negotiated by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
Despite grain being stockpiled in the port at the time of the strike, according to Ukrainian officials, food stocks did not appear to have been affected.
Friday's signing ceremony was presided over by Guterres, who "unequivocally" denounced the assault. In the meantime, the United States claimed that it "casts serious doubt" on Russia's dedication to the agreement.
Odesa officials said that the attacks injured persons without providing information on the number or kind of the injuries.
