Ukraine’s annual consumer inflation rate accelerated to 7.7%, while core inflation held at 8.1%, showing the war in the Middle East, devastating Russian ballistic strikes, and the halt of the Black Sea corridor – also caused by Russian strikes on vessels – are making the pace of price increases stickier and more persistent. Monthly inflation shows uneven dynamics again: consumer inflation rose to 0.3% in July, while core inflation, which excludes volatile components, decelerated to 0.3% in July.JOIN US ON TELEGRAMFollow our coverage of the war on the @Kyivpost_official. But annual data shows core inflation held steady this month and refused to back down, while consumer inflation began accelerating slightly. Volodymyr Lepushynskyi, deputy governor of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU), previously said preliminary July data pointed to a reversal of the inflation trend, and warned there is a risk inflation stays stuck above the NBU’s 5% target for an extended period. The latest report was published by the State Statistics Service on Monday. Logistics costs have kept accelerating substantially for a third consecutive month, following the spike caused by the war in the Middle East. Fuel prices rose 28% year-over-year in July – only a slight sign of deceleration from June’s 33% increase. Transportation services, meanwhile, rose 28.9% annually, up from 23.1% in June, an even stronger acceleration. Road passenger transport prices rose 6% month-over-month for a second consecutive month, bringing teh annual rate to 30.8%, while railway passenger transport rose 2.8% on the month and 15.5% annually.