The EU assures that it is in Putin's hands to end the war and avoid a food and energy catastrophe

BRUSSELS, 8 Jul. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The European Union on Friday blamed Russia for the consequences of the war in Ukraine on energy and food security, insisting that it is in the hands of President Vladimir Putin to end a "meaningless" war and avoid a "catastrophe". "Food and energy.

In his speech at the G20 Foreign Ministers' meeting in Indonesia, the EU's High Representative for Foreign Policy, Josep Borrell, stated that the Russian war of aggression has "dramatically" aggravated the food crisis, doubling in two years the population suffering from food insecurity.

"A rapid response to many of these problems remains in the hands of one man: President Putin, who must stop this senseless war and prevent a global food and energy catastrophe," Borrell said at the international forum.

The head of European diplomacy has insisted that the blockade of grain in Ukrainian ports is a "deliberate attempt to use food as a weapon of war" against the most vulnerable countries in the world. And he has stressed that Moscow is solely responsible for this situation and not the European sanctions.

"The agricultural sector in Russia is not in the spotlight. Our sanctions do not prohibit the import of Russian agricultural products or fertilizers, nor the payment of such Russian exports," he stressed.

In this sense, he recalled the actions carried out by the EU to address the food crisis, starting with 7,000 million that it will mobilize until 2024 to respond to the situation, in addition to the support to increase local production capacity and the efforts to get cereals from Ukraine via alternative routes.