Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova's reply to a media question regarding the US Secretary of State's statement on the Black Sea Initiative
4 August 2023 16:06
1554-04-08-2023
Question: The US Secretary of State again urged Russia to restore the Black Sea Initiative on the export of Ukrainian food and solemnly repeated that Russian fertilisers and agricultural products are not under the sanctions. Can you comment on his statement?
Maria Zakharova: Indeed, in the past few days we have been hearing more statements and loud talk as regards global food security and the alleged key role of the Black Sea Initiative in this issue. The Western capitals are again and again hurling accusations at Russia for suspending the initiative, which in fact became a commercial project to get more money for Ukraine.
The real state of affairs is hushed up. They do not mention that Ukrainian grain, primarily fodder grain, was mostly sent to well-fed Europe. Nor do they admit that the Kiev regime was using the maritime humanitarian Odessa-Istanbul corridor for terrorist attacks against Sevastopol, the Crimean Bridge and Russian vessels. They are also silent about the systematic blocking of Russian agricultural exports with the illegal unilateral sanctions, which is why the UN-Russia Memorandum never worked.
In this context and in reply to statements by Washington and other Western capitals, we would like to say that enough is enough. Enough of the hypocrisy, lies and distortion of facts, which are stubborn things, as everyone knows.
During the year the Black Sea Initiative was implemented, about 33 million tonnes of grain, including a mere 8.8 million tonnes of wheat, were exported from the ports of Odessa, Chernomorsk and Yuzhny. That said, global grain exports were 422.4 million tonnes overall, including 205.6 million tonnes of wheat. Ukraine's share is obviously small, but it is still presented as "saving the world from hunger."
The Westerners continue talking about a reduction in global grain prices. They don't mention that prices went down from the peak numbers of March 2022, before the Black Sea Initiative was initiated, and are now at a stable low level.
Indicatively, the West believes that a de facto ban on the export of Russian and Belarusian mineral fertilisers, which led to their physical shortage, does not have any impact on the prices. And apparently, they don't care about the up to 45 million people that could have been fed with food produced with Russian ammonia fertilisers if the Ukrainians had first not stopped and then later detonated altogether the Togliatti-Odessa ammonia pipeline.
Nor do the Western capitals comment on their refusal to unblock Russian fertilisers for free transfer to the poorest countries. Instead, they try to play down Russian humanitarian wheat supplies to the needy African countries. People at the UN Secretariat have even coined telling definitions - "a handful of donations" and a "poisoned gift."
These examples and rhetoric are further indications of the commercial and limited nature of the Black Sea Initiative. They also reveal the true attitude to the Russia-UN Memorandum on normalising Russian agricultural exports. Lack of progress in its implementation has become one of the main reasons for stopping Ukrainian sea traffic.
In these conditions, our position remains the same, and we have expressed it many times: first, they need to resolve the system-related hurdles (reconnecting Rosselkhozbank to SWIFT; resuming parts supplies, reestablishing transport logistics and insurance coverage; and restoring Russian companies' access to their foreign assets). Unfortunately, it is pointless to talk about the Togliatti-Odessa ammonia pipeline. Only after all this is done will it be possible to consider the resumption of the Black Sea Initiative with the announced humanitarian goals.
There have been no positive changes so far. The Western capitals and the UN tried to present the direct channel established between Rosselkhozbank and American JP Morgan as an alternative to SWIFT, but even this channel was cut off on August 2.
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