African Union chief urges EU to ease meals funds to Russia – POLITICO

Senegalese President Macky Sall, who at the moment chairs the African Union, on Sunday referred to as on Brussels to offer some scope for African international locations to pay for imported cereals and fertilizers from Russia regardless of EU sanctions excluding Russian banks from worldwide cost techniques.

“We need to pay, however it’s turning into unattainable. So we ask the Europeans for a similar mechanism as for fuel and oil,” Sall advised Le Journal du Dimanche in an interview.

Brussels did not impose sanctions on the export of Russian cereals or fertilizers to non-EU international locations, however has excluded a number of Russian banks, together with Sberbank, from the worldwide cost mechanism SWIFT. EU guidelines, nevertheless, go away some room for international locations to make funds to Russia for different imports similar to fuel.

Final month, Sall advised a gathering of EU leaders that sanctions on Russia’s monetary system and difficulties to find insurers have been threatening imports of grains and fertilizers to Africa. After assembly with Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier this month, he once more steered that Western sanctions contribute to the meals disaster.

That downside was additionally mentioned throughout a bilateral assembly in Paris between Sall and French President Emmanuel Macron final week. Macron then advised Sall that disruptions don’t have anything to do with EU sanctions, based on an Elysée official.

Sall’s name comes as a Russian naval blockade on the Black Sea is holding again greater than 20 million tons of grain from the world meals provide and the U.N., Brussels and Washington try to unlock the state of affairs.

Sall mentioned that Senegal isn’t depending on grain imports, however warned that fertilizer shortages will have an effect on native manufacturing.

“The destabilization of Africa as a result of famine is as vital as the end result of the conflict in Ukraine right now,” the African chief warned.

The meals disaster can be on the agenda when EU leaders meet on Thursday and Friday in Brussels. Heads of state and authorities are set to once more push again towards Moscow’s propaganda and to state that Russia is solely chargeable for the present meals disaster.