Ukraine makes humanitarian flour shipment to Palestinians

KYIV: Ukraine said Thursday that it had sent flour to the Palestinian territories as part of an initiative to ship free agricultural supplies to poor countries and regions.

“Palestine received 1,000 tons of wheat flour,” Ukraine’s foreign ministry posted on X.

“The shipment is the first of three deliveries intended for Palestine… It will support over 101,000 Palestinian families for a month,” it said.

Kyiv launched the “Grain for Ukraine” initiative in a bid to ensure Russia’s invasion did not threaten its position as one of the world’s largest agricultural exporters.

Ukraine did not say whether the flour was intended for Gaza, which is facing a humanitarian crisis and steep drops in the amount of aid that has reached the coastal strip during the war between Israel and Hamas.

Kyiv was a major grain exporter to the Palestinians before Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.

Moscow has also shipped free grain to several countries in Africa, as the two countries compete for support in parts of the world that rely heavily on agricultural imports.

Global food prices shot up when Russia invaded Ukraine and the vital Black Sea waterway, from where Ukraine shipped grain around the world, was turned into a naval battleground.