Pay us for our grain, says Russia’s Klimov on Putin quitting Black Sea deal

The United Russia Party’s Andrey Klimov has clarified the reasons Russian leader Vladimir Putin decided to pull out of the Black Sea grain deal which expired on Monday. 

Addressing a media briefing on the sidelines of the Brics Political Parties Plus Dialogue taking place at Birchwood Hotel in Boksburg on Gauteng's East Rand on Tuesday, Klimlov said: “There are a lot of rumours around that but Russia supplied, supplying and will supply our grain to any country that would like to buy it or receive it as our aid.

“Within [a] one-year period, the poor countries received from this deal only 3% of grain — that’s nothing — but the majority received in the European Union and the United States.

“It is not about poor countries, it is about a very strange situation when we send our grain and cannot get our money back for the grain because they block our transactions by their illegal sanctions. 

“It's an illegal response from our Western partners for the possibility of a grain deal. Mr Putin said we are not against prolonging this grain deal [except] in [the] case if all members of this deal will fully implement their obligations.

“This is the only reason. If people from rich countries will pay us for our grain, of course, we can send them our grain — but if they don’t, why should we do that? It’s a stupid situation.

“Let them pay for our goods, money according to the agreements. Russia, again stressed that and confirms that we will send our grain, fertilisers and maybe our energy resources to poor countries. Of course, this is our obligation  — but we have this obligation not because we received an order from Washington or somebody else. This is our own sovereign decision.”

Russia will continue to support in Africa, Asia and Latin America, added Klimov.

Meanwhile, on Saturday Reuters reported that Putin had a phone call with President Cyril Ramaphosa in which they discussed the grain deal. 

Putin reiterated to Ramaphosa that commitments to remove obstacles to Russian food and fertiliser exports had not yet been fulfilled, the Kremlin said.

Russia has repeatedly said for this reason it sees no grounds to renew the deal, originally struck a year ago to enable Ukraine to export grain from its Black Sea ports despite the war with Russia.

Reuters reported earlier that the deal allowing the safe Black Sea export of Ukraine’s grain for the past year expired on Monday after Russia quit.

Moscow suggested that if demands to improve exports of its own grain and fertiliser were met it would consider resurrecting the Black Sea agreement.

The Black Sea deal was brokered by the UN and Turkey in July last year to combat a global food crisis worsened by Russia's February 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Ukraine and Russia are among the world's top grain exporters.

Russia has complained that under the deal not enough grain has reached poor countries. But the UN argued the arrangement has benefited those states by helping lower food prices more than 20% globally.

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