UK’s Boris Johnson to tell fellow G-7 leaders they must end Putin’s ‘stranglehold’ on food prices
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is due to call on world leaders gathered at the G-7 summit in Germany on Monday to take urgent action to get essential food supplies out of Ukraine.
The U.K. said it was working with its international partners on a plan to overcome what it called “the Russian stranglehold” on food exports, and said it will work with Ukraine to repair vital railways to use for exports instead.
“Putin’s actions in Ukraine are creating terrible aftershocks across the world, driving up energy and food prices as millions of people are on the brink of famine,” Johnson will tell the summit Monday, according to pre-released comments from Downing Street.
“Only Putin can end this needless and futile war. But global leaders need to come together and apply their combined economic and political heft to help Ukraine and make life easier for households across the world. Nothing should be off the table,” Johnson will add.
The U.K. said it was working with its international partners on a plan to overcome what it called “the Russian stranglehold” on food exports, and said it will work with Ukraine to repair vital railways to use for exports instead.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson at Independence Square after a meeting on April 9, 2022.
Ukrainian Presidential Press Service | Reuters
Global food prices have risen since the start of the war as vital produce from Ukraine (seen as the “breadbasket of Europe”) has been unable to leave the country because of a Russian blockade of Ukraine’s ports, such as Odesa, preventing exports of wheat and oil.
Ukraine supplies 10% of the world’s wheat, 12%-17% of the world’s maize and half of the world’s sunflower oil, the British government said in a statement previewing Johnson’s comments. It said 25 million tonnes of corn and wheat — the annual consumption of all the least developed countries — can’t be exported and is currently at risk of rotting in Ukrainian silos. “This problem is due to worsen dramatically with July’s harvest,” it noted.
— Holly Ellyatt
Zelenskyy set to press G-7 leaders for urgent help as Russia makes gains
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is expected to make an impassioned plea to the leaders of the Group of Seven (G-7) wealthy, industrialized nations, asking them for more heavy weaponry to combat Russian forces.
“Delays in the transfer of weapons to our state, any restrictions are actually an invitation for Russia to strike again and again,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly address on Sunday.
He said Ukraine can stop Russia’s aggression only “if we get everything we ask for, and just in time we need it — weapons, financial support, and sanctions against Russia.”
He said there are no other options “because it is here — in the sky over Kyiv, in the sea near Odesa, on the land of the Kharkiv region, Donbas, in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions — that it is being decided what life will be like in Europe in the future. Here, in Ukraine, and nowhere else.”
Rescuers work on a damaged residential building in Kyiv. Rockets hit a house and a kindergarten last Friday, leaving six people injured and one dead.
Sopa Images | Lightrocket | Getty Images
Zelenskyy’s comments come after Russia once again targeted the Ukrainian capital Kyiv over the weekend, after pulling its troops back from the city several months ago in order to focus on the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine.
The southwestern port city of Odesa was also hit, as well as the regions around the port of Mykolaiv farther up the coast to the east, Chernihiv in northern Ukraine, the northeastern area around Kharkiv and the Donbas.
On Sunday morning U.S. President Joe Biden confirmed that the G-7 will announce a ban on Russian gold imports, confirming earlier reports of an imminent ban.
— Holly Ellyatt
G-7 nations to announce import ban on Russian gold as Moscow sanctions widen
U.S. President Joe Biden, center, attends a working lunch with other G7 leaders to discuss shaping the global economy. The Group of Seven leading economic powers are meeting in Germany for their three-day annual gathering.
Kenny Holston | The New York Times via AP, Pool
The leaders of the G-7 nations will announce a ban on Russian gold imports for Moscow’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, U.S. President Joe Biden confirmed on Sunday morning.
As the leaders meet in Munich, Germany, for the latest G-7 summit, Biden took to Twitter to confirm earlier reports of an imminent ban.
“The United States has imposed unprecedented costs on Putin to deny him the revenue he needs to fund his war against Ukraine,” he said early Sunday.
“Together, the G7 will announce that we will ban the import of Russian gold, a major export that rakes in tens of billions of dollars for Russia.”
The move would add to a series of punitive penalties imposed by the West on Russia since its onslaught on Ukraine began on Feb. 24.
— Matt Clinch