Yesterday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan met with Vladimir Putin in the Black Sea port city of Sochi. The subject was the Ukrainian grain deal that Putin allowed to expire this summer. Erdogan was the one who brokered the original deal last year, so it seemed like a natural choice for him to try to restart the process. But “try” would be the operative word here. Both sides put out statements containing some positive language about “progress” being made and a willingness on both sides to try to work something out. But in the end, Putin refused to enter into any new agreement. He repeated his claims from earlier this summer, saying accommodations need to be made to ensure the safe shipment of Russian grain before he would agree to safe passage for Ukrainian cargo ships. So the situation remains in limbo for the time being. (Associated Press)

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Monday sought to persuade Russian President Vladimir Putin to revive an agreement that allowed Ukraine to export grain and other commodities from three Black Sea ports despite the war with Russia.

Putin in July refused to extend the agreement, which was brokered by Turkey and the United Nations a year earlier and was seen as vital for global food supplies, especially in Africa, the Middle East and Asia. Ukraine and Russia are major suppliers of wheat, barley, sunflower oil and other goods that developing nations rely on.

Erdogan said the grain deal was the headline issue at the daylong talks between the two leaders in Russia’s Black Sea resort of Sochi, where the Russian president has a residence.

Putin continues to argue that Russian exports of food and fertilizer have been “hampered” by restrictions on shipping and insurance costs. And yet Russia remains the primary exporter of fertilizer to Africa and they have shipped record amounts of grain already this year. If he’s looking to have someone reduce his insurance costs he should have made the clear. Unless, of course, he expects to be insured for free as the price of allowing the Ukrainian deal to move forward, which would be tantamount to blackmail.

Earlier this summer, Putin supposedly issued a list of specific items he wanted to see addressed, though it wasn’t put out for the public. They were reportedly mostly of an administrative nature rather than significant changes to foreign policy. The Secretary-General of the UN responded to the list in a letter to Putin in which he claimed to have agreed to all of the terms. But Putin continues to say he wasn’t satisfied with the response.

There has to be more to this picture than just an argument over some shipping insurance rates. It may have something to do with an incident from July when Zelensky went to Turkey and Erdogan allowed him to take five Ukrainian commanders back home with him. They were prisoners of war who had been captured by the Russians in Mariupol. During a prisoner exchange, some Russians were released but it was on the condition that the Ukrainian soldiers would remain in Turkey until the end of the war and not go back to the fight. This reportedly angered Putin greatly. Is his balking over the Ukrainian grain deal some sort of payback for that incident?

Aside from that, Putin and Erdogan seem to have gotten along better than anyone else in the NATO alliance. (As much as we can consider Turkey a real part of NATO these days, anyway.) Turkey hasn’t sanctioned Russia and has continued to engage in trade with them even as they help out Ukraine. I suppose it’s possible that Putin is hoping to leverage his position to try to force Turkey into a closer alliance with him and further away from NATO. But if that’s the case, then it seems certain that Vladimir Putin does not see the war in Ukraine ending any time in the foreseeable future.