African Union head, Macky Sall he announced that he was ‘reassured’ after talks in Russia with President Vladimir Putin on food shortages caused by Moscow’s military campaign in Ukraine.
Africa Today News, New York reports that Putin hosted the Senegalese president, who chairs the African Union, at his Black Sea residence in Sochi on the 100th day of Moscow’s offensive. Global food shortages and grain supplies stuck in Ukrainian ports were high on the agenda.
‘I found Vladimir Putin committed and aware that the crisis and sanctions create serious problems for weak economies, such as African economies,’ Sall told journalists, adding that he was leaving Russia ‘very reassured and very happy with our exchanges’.
Putin in a televised interview in the evening accused the West of “bluster” by claiming Moscow was preventing grain exports from Ukraine.
‘There is no problem to export grain from Ukraine,’ he said, suggesting several possible routes.
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Exports could transit through the Russian-controlled ports of Mariupol and Berdyansk, or the Ukrainian-held port of Odessa as long as Ukraine ‘cleared’ the waters around it of mines, according to Putin.
Other transport options include the Danube River via Romania, Hungary or Poland, he added.
“But the simplest, the easiest, the cheapest would be exports via Belarus, from there one can go to Baltic ports, then to the Baltic Sea and then anywhere in the world.”
But Putin said any export via Belarus would be conditional on the “lifting of sanctions” by the West against Minsk, allied to Moscow.
Ahead of the talks, which lasted three hours, Sall asked Putin “to become aware that our countries… are victims” of the conflict.
He said it was important to work together so that “everything that concerns food, grain, fertiliser is actually outside” Western sanctions imposed on Moscow after Putin sent troops to Ukraine on February 24.
In his remarks before the talks, Putin did not mention grain supplies but said Russia was ‘always on Africa’s side’ and was now keen to ramp up cooperation.
‘We place great importance on our relations with African countries, and I must say this has had a certain positive result,’ Putin added.
Washington and Brussels have imposed unprecedented sanctions against Moscow, pushing Putin to seek new markets and strengthen ties with countries in Africa and Asia.
The Kremlin said the two leaders discussed expanding “political dialogue” between Russia and the African Union as well as economic and humanitarian cooperation.