Regarding Russia's Release From The Food Agreement, UN: Deepen The Crisis

The first commercial shipment M/V Riva Wind from Ukraine brought 50,000 tons of wheat ordered. (Doc. ANTARA/Ukraine Embassy Documentation)

JAKARTA - Russia's exit from the agreement to export grains from the Black Sea is expected to boost food prices in a number of areas including Asia.

The United Nations has warned Russia's move out of the Black Sea food deal and the important ports bombings will exacerbate the crisis.

"We are now witnessing food security being hit hard, when Russia in four consecutive days attacked Ukraine's port in the Black Sea in Odesa, Chornosk and Mykolaiv with missiles and drones," UN Political Affairs Chiefpollo told the Security Council.

DiCarlo strongly condemned the Russian action and the country immediately stopped its action.

"The new wave of attacks targeting Ukrainian ports risks creating a great impact on global food security, especially in developing countries," he said, quoted by ANTARA, Saturday, July 22.

"The threat regarding the possibility of civilian ships sailing in the Black Sea being targeted, really doesn't make sense," he continued.

UN aid chief Martin Griffith called Russia's move out of the food deal "very disappointing".

"For 362 million people the move is not a matter of sadness or disappointment: It concerns things that threaten their future, their children and their families," Griffith said.

"They are not sad, but angry. They are worried, they are restless. Some will be starving, some will be very starving, maybe many will die as a result of this Russian decision," he said again.

Griffith requested the Security Council to make every effort to restore the Black Sea food deal.

The agreement was signed in Istanbul in July last year by Russia, Ukraine, Turkey, and the United Nations.

The agreement created a safe corridor past the Black Sea for exports from three Ukrainian ports that had stalled since the war began in February 2022.

The deal helped control food prices that soared and eased the global food crisis by restoring the flow of wheat, solar flower oil, fertilizer, and other products from Ukraine, which is one of the largest exporters of grain food products in the world.

This week Moscow refused to extend the agreement after July 17 by arguing that parts related to Russia's request "have not been implemented so far".

The part Russia wants is to remove barriers to Russia's fertilizer exports, including bringing Russia's Agricultural Bank into the SWIFT international payment system.