• The Razoni anchored near the Bosphorus entrance from the Black Sea about 1800 GMT.
• It was carrying 26,527 tonnes of corn to Lebanon and left Ukraine’s Odesa port 36 hours ago.
• A senior Turkish official said Ankara expects one ship to leave Ukraine every day as long as export deal is in place.

The first grain-carrying ship to leave Ukrainian ports during the war safely anchored off Turkey’s coast on Tuesday, while a senior official said Ankara expects one grain ship to leave Ukraine every day as long as the export deal is in place.

The Razoni, carrying 26,527 tonnes of corn to Lebanon, anchored near the Bosphorus entrance from the Black Sea about 1800 GMT, 36 hours after leaving Ukraine’s Odesa port.

According to Turkey’s Defense Ministry, a group from the Joint Coordination Centre (JCC) in Istanbul, where Russian, Ukrainian, Turkish, and United Nations troops work, is scheduled to assess the ship at 0700 GMT on Wednesday.

The voyage was made possible after Ankara and the UN arranged a grain and fertiliser export agreement between Moscow and Kyiv last month, a rare diplomatic victory in a conflict that has devolved into a drawn-out battle of attrition.

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The shipments from one of the world’s leading grain producers are designed to aid in the alleviation of a global food crisis.

“The plan is for a ship to leave…every day,” the senior Turkish official told Reuters, referring to Odesa and two other Ukrainian ports covered by the deal. “If nothing goes wrong, exports will be made via one ship a day for a while.”

The official, who requested anonymity, added that the Razoni’s departure was delayed by “technical problems” that had now been resolved, and NATO member Turkey expected the safe-passage corridor to function well.

The four parties have agreed to monitor imports and perform inspections from the JCC in Istanbul, which straddles the Bosphorus Strait, which connects the Black Sea to global markets.

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