Russia Agrees to Let Ukraine Ship Grain, Easing World Food Shortage
BRUSSELS — After three months of talks that often seemed doomed, Russia and Ukraine signed an agreement on Friday to free more than 20 million tons of grain stuck in Ukraine’s blockaded Black Sea ports, a deal with global implications for bringing down high food prices and alleviating shortages and a mounting hunger crisis.

Senior United Nations officials said that the first shipments out of Odesa and neighboring ports were only weeks away and could quickly bring five million tons of Ukrainian food to the world market each month, freeing up storage space for Ukraine’s fresh harvests. The difference might be felt most powerfully in the drought-stricken Horn of Africa, which relies heavily on Ukrainian and Russian grain.

The breakthrough, brokered with the help of the United Nations and Turkey, is the most significant compromise between the warring nations since Russia invaded Ukraine in February, but it moves them no closer to peace. While government ministers signed the agreement in an ornate room in Istanbul, with their countries’ flags lined up together, a few hundred miles away their troops continued to kill and maim each other.