Russia does not let the point out: UN warns that affected would be those most in need

The general secretary of the UNAntónio Guterres, regretted this Monday the Russian decision to abandon the agreements of the Black Seawhich allowed the export of ukrainian cerealsand assured that “It will be a blow to those in need everywhere.”

Guterres, in statements to journalists, recalled that in recent days he had written to Russian President Vladimir Putin with proposals to keep this initiative alive and expressed his “deeply disappointed” that he ignored them.

“Ultimately, participating in these agreements is a choice, but struggling people everywhere and developing countries have no choice. Hundreds of millions of people are facing hunger and consumers are facing a global cost of living crisis. They will pay the price.”he insisted.

In this sense, he stressed that today there was already a rise in wheat prices, after the Black Sea agreements helped stabilize markets for months by facilitating the departure of more than 32 million tons of food products from ports ukrainians.

The head of the United Nations assured that, despite the Kremlin’s decision, the organization will continue its efforts to “facilitate unimpeded access to global markets for products and fertilizers from both Ukraine and the Russian Federation.”

“Our goal must continue to be to improve global food security and price stability,” explained Guterres, who stressed that solutions will continue to be sought.

Russia said today that it decided not to renew the agreements on the grounds that the sanctions that have been imposed after the invasion of Ukraine prevent the part of the agreement that must also guarantee Russian food and fertilizer exports from being fulfilled.

“In practice, the Black Sea agreements expired today. Unfortunately, the part of the Black Sea agreement that refers to Russia has not been fulfilled. Therefore, (the agreement) loses its force ”, said Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov.

He assured at the same time that “as soon as the Russian part is fulfilled”his country “I will immediately re-implement this agreement.”

In response, Guterres cited parts of his recent letter to Putin highlighting the high levels of Russian grain sales that have been achieved and the stabilization that has been seen in the fertilizer markets, with exports “Approaching full recovery.”

In addition, he recalled that the UN helped the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union (EU) clarify or modify their sanctions to facilitate Russian agricultural exports, not covered by those punishments, but which had been indirectly affected.

Thus, he also highlighted that a specific payment channel has been created for the Russian agricultural bank, Rosseljozbank, outside of SWIFT and that -at Russia’s insistence- a proposal was recently put forward to allow a subsidiary of the bank to recover access to that system of financial transactions.

Source: EFE