Statements by European politicians that anti-Russian sanctions do not threaten world food security lose their meaning amid additional obstacles that are placed on goods from the Russian Federation and Belarus that are not subject to restrictions, said Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova.

So the diplomat commented on the recommendations of the European Commission, in which the national accreditation bodies of the EU are invited to stop providing services for assessing compliance with the Union's standards for goods from Russia and Belarus that are not subject to restrictions.

“There is every reason to believe that the European Commission sends out similar circulars to the EU capitals and on other issues.

In this regard, the loud statements of Brussels, in particular regarding the fact that the imposed sanctions do not formally affect the export of Russian food and fertilizers, and therefore do not threaten global food security, are worth absolutely nothing, ”says Zakharova, published on the website of the Foreign Ministry .

According to the diplomat, EU officials are deliberately working behind the scenes to impose the widest possible application of restrictions on interaction with Russia to the countries of the union.

“The consequences for the economy of neither the EU itself, nor third countries, including the poorest countries, which can suffer the most from the food crisis and whose interests are so much baked in words in the EU, are not taken into account.

And after all this, the EU does not hesitate to hypocritically claim that they have nothing to do with the difficulties that our exporters face with the delivery of Russian grain and fertilizers to developing countries.

It's time to stop misleading the international community," Zakharova stressed.

  • Maria Zakharova, official representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia

  • RIA News

  • © Grigory Sysoev

"We've made a lot of mistakes"

European countries began to introduce broad economic sanctions against Russia after the start of a special operation in Ukraine.

However, functionaries and top officials of the EU states deny that these restrictive measures had a direct impact on the food crisis in the EU itself and other countries of the world.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen called these allegations "Russian disinformation."

Speaking to reporters on May 31 following the EU summit in Brussels, von der Leyen said that the only reason for the food crisis is the armed conflict in Ukraine.

However, Russia has repeatedly emphasized that this position is only an attempt by the leadership of Europe and the United States to absolve themselves of responsibility for short-sighted political decisions.

Thus, in early June, President Vladimir Putin recalled that the unfavorable situation on the world food market began to take shape long before the start of the special operation in Ukraine.

“It began to take shape as early as February 2020 in the process of combating the consequences of the coronavirus pandemic, when the world economy, the world economy sat down and it was necessary to restore the world economy,” Putin said in an interview with Pavel Zarubin, a journalist for the Rossiya 1 TV channel.

The head of state also drew attention to the fact that after the start of the special operation, Western countries began to take steps that aggravated the situation on the world markets for agricultural fertilizers.

“The yield depends on the amount of fertilizer.

As soon as it became clear that there would be no our fertilizers on the world market, the prices for fertilizers and food immediately went up, because if there are no fertilizers, then there is no necessary volume of agricultural production.

Our partners themselves have made a lot of mistakes, and now they are looking for someone to blame, and, of course, in this sense, Russia is the most convenient candidate, ”Putin stressed.

The President also denied accusations from the West that Russia allegedly prevents the export of grain from the territory of Ukraine, which is actively sought by the EU countries, the US and the UK.

Putin called such statements a bluff and stressed that the only obstacle to the export of grain through Ukrainian ports is their mining by the Ukrainian side.

  • Vladimir Putin

  • RIA News

  • © Mikhail Metzel

The Russian leader recalled that Moscow had given guarantees to Western colleagues in ensuring the peaceful passage of ships with grain into international waters and that it would not use the situation for attacks from the sea if the Kyiv regime cleared mines from the ports under its control.

Moscow is also ready to ensure the export of grain through the ports of the Sea of ​​Azov controlled by Russian forces, the president added.

In addition, grain can be exported through Romania, Hungary, Poland or Belarus.

“So there is no problem with the export of grain from Ukraine,” Putin concluded.

However, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky later refused to export grain through Belarus, from where it could be delivered to the Baltic ports.

“We were offered to go (to export grain. -

RT

) through Belarus by rail.

We even understand how much.

But we understand why we were offered this.

We are not yet ready to follow this format and help our “friendly” neighbors, ”RBC-Ukraine quotes Zelensky.

"Special Behavior"

According to the President of the Russian Association for Baltic Studies, Nikolai Mezhevich, the actions of European officials are politically motivated and will lead to serious consequences in the EU food market.

“This looks like a twisted suicide attempt.

On the one hand, Russia is accused of rising food prices, on the other hand, obstacles are being put to its goods and preventing Russia from lowering these prices.

This is similar to the campaign in the United States, where Vladimir Putin is personally blamed for the increase in gasoline prices.

This was not even during the Cold War, ”the expert emphasized in a conversation with RT.

  • European Commission

  • AP

  • © Darko Vojinovic

In turn, Alexei Mukhin, Director General of the Center for Political Information, said in a commentary to RT that the European bureaucracy is not able to adequately control such a large process as the introduction of restrictive measures against the export of food and other goods from Russia.

“The sanctioning countries themselves are already confused about what influences and what does not affect the situation with prices.

With the help of these verbal tricks, exclusions from the sanctions list of food and fertilizers, while introducing additional recommendations to the EC, they are simply trying to confuse the European public about the difficult situation in which they have driven the economy with their short-sighted actions.

Now they say one thing, tomorrow they will say something else.

These are attempts to avoid responsibility for stupid decisions that were made and continue to be made, ”the expert said.

Statements that sanctions against Russia allegedly do not affect food prices in any way are aimed at absolving themselves of responsibility to the population of EU member states, Mukhin said.

“This is a special form of behavior when people start to lie and cannot stop.

In principle, they tend to shift from a sick head to a healthy one.

Now European officials are trying to shift all their miscalculations, mistakes from their sore head onto a healthy Russian head and get out of the water dry, ”the RT interlocutor emphasized.

At the same time, a wide range of sanctions against Russia, even despite the existence of formal exceptions, will result in a violation of supply chains and lead to an inevitable increase in prices, Mukhin said.

“This situation will lead to the most serious logistical imbalances and disruption of supply chains, with corresponding consequences for many sectors of the economy, from energy to food products.

I think that those who imputed sanctions to Russia and forced other countries to do so, they did not calculate such an effect, for which they will now pay with the deepest and most comprehensive crisis, ”concluded the expert.