(NewsDakota.com/USAgNet) – United Nations aid chief Martin Griffiths said on Thursday it was unlikely the Black Sea grain deal would be expanded in the near term to include more Ukrainian ports or reduce inspection times.

Kyiv has called for an expansion of the deal with Moscow which was mediated by the United Nations and Turkey and allows Ukraine, a major global grain exporter, to ship food products from three of its Black Sea ports despite Russia’s invasion, reports Reuters.

Officials are traving to Ukraine this week to visit the southern cities of Mykolaiv and recently liberated Kherson as Ukraine grapples with winter power outages caused by Russian air strikes on critical infrastructure.

Russian and Ukrainian representatives have discussed the possibility of linking a prisoner swap that would release a large number of prisoners on both side to the resumption of ammonia exports.