A Russian captain has been charged with smuggling Ukrainian grain

The Security Service of Ukraine announced that it had charged Mykola Yelagin, captain of the dry cargo ship *Matros Pozynich*, with participating in a scheme to smuggle more than 54,000 metric tons of Ukrainian grain out of the temporarily occupied territories.

According to the investigation, from March 2022 to June 2024, Elagin arranged for agricultural products to be loaded aboard ships at the closed port of Sevastopol and transported out of Ukraine under the guise of products from the Russian Federation. At least two instances of the illegal export of wheat to the Syrian port of Latakia have been documented: 27,074 metric tons in November 2022 from the Donetsk region and another 27,300 metric tons in January 2023.

To conceal his actions, the captain periodically turned off the Automatic Identification System (AIS) and transmitted false data regarding the vessel’s coordinates. Yelagin’s actions have been classified under Part 1 of Article 438 (violation of the laws and customs of war) and Part 2 of Article 332-1 (violation of the procedure for entering the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.

Source: “The Book of Torturers of the Ukrainian People.”

The European Union may impose sanctions against individuals and companies suspected of facilitating the transport of grain exported from the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine to the port of Haifa (Israel).

Ukraine supported Latvia’s measures to restrict the transit of Russian grain.