MOSCOW, September 20. /TASS/. Ukraine is starting to lose allies in the West against the backdrop of huge expenditure on support for the Kiev regime and obvious collapse of the ‘anti-Russia’ project, Leonid Slutsky, chairman of the State Duma Committee on International Affairs and leader of the LDPR party, opined.
"In the wake of an increasingly evident collapse of the ‘anti-Russia’ project, Kiev is starting to lose allies <…> [Polish] President [Andrzej] Duda refused to meet with [Ukrainian President Vladimir] Zelensky on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly and compared Ukraine to a drowning person capable of pulling others down into the maelstrom," Slutsky wrote on his Telegram channel.
"The more time goes by, the more European bureaucrats leave for their ‘apartments’, as they have begun to realize how much it costs their countries and them personally to support Zelensky and propagate aggressive Russophobia," the politician said.
According to Slutsky, the EU members are being economically ranked lower and lower compared to the BRICS-oriented nations.
The meeting between the Ukrainian and Polish presidents, which was expected to be held on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York, has not been arranged yet, Marcin Przydacz, Secretary of State in Duda’s office and head of the International Policy Bureau, said on Polish television. The Rzeczpospolita newspaper previously reported that the meeting between Duda and Zelensky had been cancelled. The newspaper believes that the talks might be of particular importance against the backdrop of the embargo on Ukrainian grain supplies.
On September 15, the European Commission ruled not to extend its ban on imports of grain and other agricultural products from Ukraine, but demanded that Kiev submit a plan of action to avoid market distortions in EU countries. After that, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia announced their own unilateral bans on Ukrainian grain imports. In response, Kiev filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization. When commenting to journalists on the unilateral ban on Ukrainian grain imports, the Polish president said that Kiev was acting like a drowning person, desperately clinging to everything available. Duda pointed out that Warsaw had the right to protect itself from potential harm.