Ukrainian President Volodymir Zelensky on Thursday denounced that Russian invading troops are deliberately trying to damage the country's agricultural sector, one of the main sources of national revenue, an action that would have a high impact on global food security.
In a message to the Dutch Parliament, the president indicated that Russian forces are “doing everything they can to ruin our agricultural potential and cause a food crisis not only in Ukraine but in the world.”
According to him, soldiers sent by Vladimir Putin have laid landmines in the fields and agricultural equipment has been destroyed.
On Tuesday, FAO Director-General Qu Dongyu said that the war in Ukraine threatens global food security, as well as economic recovery following the COVID pandemic.
The world “has suffered the impact of the war in Ukraine, on food and fertilizer prices” that are rising, Qu warned. “This threatens consumers and producers, and can also affect the economic recovery after the pandemic,” added the director of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
In turn, Russia was accused by the US at the UN of causing a “global food crisis” that could lead to a “famine” by attacking Ukraine and sparking a war between two cereal-producing powers.
World Food Programme (WFP) director David Beasley and Wendy Sherman recalled that Ukraine and Russia are among the “largest producers” of cereals. They account for “30% of world exports of wheat, 20% of world corn and 75% of sunflower oil”. Almost “50% of the grain we buy comes from Ukraine and we feed 125 million people” before the war, Beasley said. He warned that the impact could be “devastating” for GPA operations.
On the other hand, Zelensky said in his message to MPs that, by purchasing Russian gas, the Netherlands is contributing to the contest in Ukraine and assured that “stronger sanctions are needed so that Russia has no chance of continuing the war” because “this should not last another 36 days. It's not about military success, it's about terror, they kill like it's a game,” he lamented.
The Netherlands is one of the European countries where Ukraine's express membership application to the European Union (EU) has met the most objections.
For Prime Minister Mark Rutte, Ukraine will benefit the most if the EU focuses on helping Ukrainians in the short term because the European Commission's assessment of the application, the first step towards eventual accession, can take “months or years”. “Our membership depends on you, friend Mark,” Zelensky told him today.
(With information from AFP and EFE)
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