Greece and Bulgaria discuss transit of grain from Ukraine by railroad

During a meeting in Athens on Monday, Prime Ministers of Greece and Bulgaria Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Nikolay Denkov discussed the problem of transit of Ukrainian grain in view of Russia’s withdrawal from the grain deal and shelling of Ukrainian ports. This was reported by the Bulgarian portal Mediapool.

The Bulgarian Prime Minister said in a conversation with journalists that the possibility of transporting Ukrainian grain by train through Bulgaria to Greek ports is being discussed, but did not provide any details.

According to Mediapool, the proposal was for Bulgarian trains to load grain at the Ukrainian-Romanian border and then transport it through Romanian and Bulgarian territory to Greece.

At the same time, it is unclear which Bulgarian carriers will be able to transport such cargo, given the shortage of locomotives and wagons at the state-owned carrier. It is also doubtful that private railroad companies will be able to carry out such transportation with their existing rolling stock.

As Denkov noted, Greece has already begun to build rail lines of particular interest to Bulgaria, to Kulata and Svilengrad. Improving the technical condition of the railways in these two areas would allow more cargo to be transported from Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine and Moldova to Greek ports.

As a reminder, on July 17, Russia announced the suspension of the grain deal and threatened “risks” to the parties that decide to continue the initiative without Russia’s participation. In addition, Moscow began massive shelling of the port infrastructure of Odesa and the Danube ports.

Tags: export, grain, Greece, rail transportation, Bulgaria