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Putin points out real causes of food crisis to Austrian Chancellor — Kremlin

The President stressed that attempts to blame Russia for difficulties in supplying agricultural products to the world markets are groundless

MOSCOW, May 27. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin in a telephone conversation with Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer slammed the attempts to shift responsibility for the global food crisis on Moscow as "groundless" and pointed to the real causes of the situation, the Kremlin press service reported on Friday following the conversation between the two leaders.

"There was a detailed exchange of views on issues related to global food security. Vladimir Putin stressed that attempts to blame Russia for difficulties in supplying agricultural products to the world markets are groundless," the report said.

It is noted that Putin gave "detailed explanations of the real causes of these problems, which arose, among other reasons, due to anti-Russian sanctions of the United States and the European Union".

The situation in Ukraine and large-scale sanctions imposed on Russia by the US and the EU have led to disruptions in grain supplies, which increases the risk of a food crisis in a number of countries around the world. Since the beginning of the year, prices for wheat and corn have risen by 30%. As it was noted at a meeting of the UN Security Council on May 21, the world has enough wheat for only 10 weeks, and the situation is worse than in the 2007-2008 crisis years.

Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that the global food crisis happened long before the start of the special military operation in Ukraine, its causes included the coronavirus pandemic and miscalculations of Western countries. Lavrov added that the current situation had exacerbated the problem, and that Western sanctions were one of the key reasons for the disruption of food supplies, which deepened the crisis.