 The probability of a conflict between NATO and Russia in the Black Sea is increasing. The new NATO-Ukraine Council held a closed-door meeting in Brussels on July 26 to discuss the Black Sea situation. The meeting had been requested by Ukraine. NATO later released a brief statement vowing to step up reconnaissance in the region Russian Vedomosti notes. Tensions around grain supplies via the Black Sea flared up after Russia refused to agree to a further extension of the grain deal on July 17. The Russian Defence Ministry said that all ships bound for Ukraine's Black Sea ports would be deemed potential carriers of military cargo starting on July 20. In response, Kiev threatened to sink vessels heading to Russian ports via the Black Sea. The Russian armed forces carried out strikes on port infrastructure facilities in Odessa and other Ukrainian ports. Attempts to militarise the Black Sea at the expense of third countries is one of Ukraine's policy goals in the wake of the grain deal's demise. Denis Denisov, an expert at the Financial University under the government of the Russian Federation, noted, however the deployment of NATO naval forces would mean a direct conflict with Russia. The alliance cannot take such a step, so Kiev's calls regarding the need for the presence of NATO ships in the Black Sea will remain at the purely declamatory level of slogans. According to the expert, while NATO is already providing comprehensive support to Ukraine, the North Atlantic Alliance will not commit to a direct confrontation with Russia in the Black Sea. The NATO-Ukraine Council was established at the Vilnius Summit as a sort of consolation prize to compensate Kiev for not being granted NATO membership. It is a purely consultative body without any authority to make decisions, said Ivan Skorikov, head of the Ukraine Department at the Institute of the CIS Countries. Kiev has already requested that NATO ships provide protective escorts for its vessels along the grain corridor in order to be able to continue implementing the Black Sea initiative without Russia. However, the Black Sea literal state in NATO, Turkey, Romania and Bulgaria will not take part in such a mission. Bucharest and Sofia simply do not have enough vessels in their respective fleets while Ankara continues to adhere to the principle of non-intervention in the conflict, Skorikov explained. As for the US and Great Britain, they do not have the right to maintain a long-term presence in the Black Sea under the Montreux Convention regarding the regime of the Turkish Straits and Turkey has no intention of handing over the keys to the Bosporus and the Dardanelles to them. This is why the Ukrainian leadership will have to content themselves with merely dreaming about NATO escorts for grain convoys in the Black Sea, Skorikov concluded.