US will hold Russia accountable for implementing UN-brokered deal to resume Ukraine’s Black Sea grain exports
- The countries signed separate agreements with Türkiye and the UN to enable Ukraine to export the grain held up in Black Sea ports owing to the war
- The US on Friday called out China for stockpiling grain that could be used for global humanitarian needs
The United States said on Friday it will hold Russia accountable for implementing a UN brokered deal to resume Ukraine’s Black Sea grain exports and called out China for stockpiling grain that could be used for global humanitarian needs.
Russia and Ukraine are major global wheat suppliers, but Moscow’s February 24 invasion of its neighbour sent food prices soaring, stoking a global food crisis the World Food Programme says has pushed some 47 million people into “acute hunger.”
Russia and Ukraine signed a landmark deal on Friday to reopen Ukrainian Black Sea ports for grain exports. The war has stalled Kyiv’s exports, leaving dozens of ships stranded and some 20 million tonnes of grain stuck in silos.
US Ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, said Washington hopes the deal “will help mitigate the crisis Russia has caused,” adding that “we will be watching closely to ensure that Russia actually follows through.”
The United States also wants to see China help combat the global food crisis, James O’Brien, head of the US State Department’s Office of Sanctions Coordination, told reporters.
Russian shelling kills 6 in Donbas; Putin and Erdogan to discuss grain exports
“We would like to see it act like the great power that it is and provide more grain to the poor people around the world,” he said. “China has been a very active buyer of grain and it is stockpiling grain … at a time when hundreds of millions of people are entering the catastrophic phase of food insecurity.”
China’s grain stocks at the end of the 2021/22 season were estimated by the International Grains Council to be 323.4 million tons, more than half the global total of 607.4 million. It dwarfs those of the United States, the world’s top grain exporter, which were estimated at 57.8 million tons.
“We would like to see them play more of a role of making the grain available from their own stockpiles and by allowing WFP (World Food Programme) and others to obtain grain,” said O’Brien.
He said he some 40 per cent of the first grain shipments out of Ukraine in April went to China “which was awkward,” adding: “It would have been much better to see that grain going to Egypt, in the Horn of Africa and other places.”
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Deal reached to end Russia’s blockade of Ukraine grain exports and ease global food crisis
China’s embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment on O’Brien’s remarks.
“We believe it’s essential that food, including grain, go everywhere where it’s needed,” deputy UN spokesman Farhan Haq said on Friday.
The deal agreed through UN and Turkish mediation establishes safe corridors along which Ukrainian ships can come in and out of three designated Black Sea ports in and around Odesa.
Both sides also pledged not to attack ships on the way in or out.
Millions desperately need an end to Russia’s blockade of Ukraine grain
Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhaylo Podolyak warned Russian breaches of the deal and incursions around Ukraine’s ports would be met with “an immediate military response”.
A joint command and control centre will be set up in Istanbul to oversee smooth operations and resolve disputes.
But all the pieces may not start coming together until next month. UN officials say Ukraine may send out a few ships at first to make sure the deal works.
“We’re talking about a few weeks before we’ll see a proper implementation of vessels going in and out,” one UN official said.
Russia has sent combine harvesters to two occupied regions of Ukraine from Crimea to cover a shortage of equipment needed to bring in crops, a representative of a Russian-installed local administration said.
“A shortage in agricultural machinery was revealed during the harvesting campaign in the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions,” a representative of the Russian-installed administration of Zaporizhzhia region told reporters in the village of Lobanove in northern Crimea.
The representative did not provide his name. Crimea was annexed by Russia from Ukraine in 2014.
He was speaking standing near several red and black combine harvesters made by Russia-Belarusian joint venture Bryanskselmash. Soon afterwards, Reuters filmed them heading off in the direction of Zaporizhzhia.
The official said the harvesters were needed because “the equipment that was there before had either been dismantled or taken away by the previous owners outside the regions”, he said.
Evgeny Balitsky, head of the occupation administration in Zaporizhzhia, said on social media that these combine harvesters were provided by Russia’s agriculture ministry. The region should receive an additional 75 agricultural machines during harvesting, he added.
Reporting by Associated Press, Reuters
