Military escorts for ships with food from Ukraine dangerous: Russian Dy Foreign Minister

Moscow [Russia], July 22 (ANI): Russian Deputy Foreign Minister, Sergey Vershinin, on Friday that the option of providing military escorts to ships carrying food from Ukraine outside of the grain deal is dangerous and unrealistic, Russian News Agency, TASS reported. 
"With respect to warships escorting some other ships, I think we have to go to the source of this information. We have not discussed these issues. I think that this option is dangerous and unrealizable," he said at a news conference, in comments on reports that Turkish warships could escort ships with Ukrainian grain. 
Further, Russia also wants ships in the Black Sea to be inspected to make sure they are not being used to carry weapons, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Vershinin told a briefing on Friday, TASS reported.
Speaking about the statement of the Russian Ministry of Defense that Moscow will consider all ships that go to Ukrainian ports along the Black Sea as carriers of military cargo, Vershinin said, "What is meant there is that we must make sure of this, we must check if a ship is carrying something bad." 
"This means an inquiry, an inspection, if necessary, to make sure whether this is true or not," the deputy minister stressed, TASS reported. 
Vershinin called this approach "completely logical, especially after the attacks that took place". 
"Now there is no maritime humanitarian corridor; there are already zones of increased military danger," he said. 
On Wednesday, Russia’s Defense Ministry announced that effective at midnight Moscow time on July 20, Russia, in connection with the termination of the grain deal, will consider all ships destined for Ukrainian ports traversing the Black Sea to be carriers of military cargo, TASS reported. 
The Defense Ministry clarified that those countries under whose flags such vessels are sailing will be deemed to be involved in the Ukrainian conflict on the side of Kyiv. 
The ministry also reported that a number of sea areas in the northwestern and southeastern parts of the international waters of the Black Sea have been declared temporarily dangerous for navigation, TASS reported. 
The Black Sea Grain Deal expired on July 17. Russia had agreed to extend the agreement to provide a shipping corridor across the Black Sea for ships carrying Ukrainian grain several times since it had been signed in July 2022 but said that the Russia-related provisions of the deal, which called for removing hurdles to Russian farm exports, had not been fulfilled, TASS reported. 
Moscow also said that, although the agreements were intended to direct food supplies to the poorest countries, most Ukrainian grain shipments went to wealthy Western countries.
Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia was ready to return to the deal only when the Russia-related part of the agreement was fulfilled. (ANI)