“Stop threatening to suspend food and fertilizer exports to countries that criticize your war of aggression,” he added.
According to Blinken, “the Russian army has literally hijacked the food supply of millions of Ukrainians and millions of people in the world.”
The Russian ambassador to the UN, Vassily Nebenzia, flatly refuted the West’s accusations, which, he said, consist of “blaming Russia for all the world’s problems.”
The food crisis in the world has existed for a long time and its root causes are due to an “inflationary spiral” fueled by rising insurance costs, difficult logistics flows and “speculation in Western markets”, the Russian diplomat said
Ukrainian ports are blocked by Ukraine, by mines scattered in the country along the Black Sea shore and by kyiv’s unwillingness to cooperate with shipowners to free several dozen foreign ships, he added.
The Russian diplomat once again denounced the imposition of Western sanctions against his country, assuring that their consequences aggravate food insecurity.
“Sanctions do not block Black Sea ports, immobilize ships full of food or destroy Ukrainian roads and railways,” had previously said Antony Blinken.
“The sanctions do not prevent Russia from exporting food or fertilizers” since they “deliberately exclude food, fertilizers and seeds from Russia,” said the Secretary of State, for whom the “decision to turn food into a weapon is Moscow’s and only from Moscow.”
The day before, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres had urged Russia to free Ukrainian grain exports and the West to allow Russian fertilizers to enter international markets.
Unlike the strong tone of the diplomacy of both powers, also today the chiefs of staff of the United States and Russia spoke by phone, for the first time since the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine, and agreed to keep the lines of communication open, announced the Pentagon.
In this communication, Generals Mark Milley and Valeri Gerasimov “discussed several worrying security issues,” said the spokesman for the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Colonel Dave Butler, who indicated that both agreed not to divulge the content of their conversation.
Source: Ambito
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