Britain's Defense Secretary Ben Wallace has called on russia to allow Ukraine to export grain to help countries where food shortages could trigger famine, reported by Reuters.
Wallace stressed that russia "must do the right thing" and open a grain corridor from Ukraine's Black Sea ports.
Wallace rejected the idea of lifting sanctions, and welcomed the suggestion of Black Sea nations, such as Turkey, escorting the Ukraine grain shipments.
"That grain is for everyone, Libya, Yemen, people around the world are relying on that grain to feed themselves," Wallace said. "I call on Russia to do the right thing in the spirit of humanity and let the grain of Ukraine out, stop stealing the grain for its own means. Let's not talk about sanctions, let's do the right thing."
Earlier the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba called not to succumb to blackmail of russia about "corridor" for the Ukrainian harvest through the Black Sea in exchange for lifting the sanctions.
According to Ukrainian intelligence, russia can export stolen grain from Ukraine via the Mediterranean to Syria, and from there the goods can be smuggled to other countries in the Middle East.
In late April, Minister of Agrarian Policy Taras Vysotsky said that russia had stolen "several hundred thousand tons" of grain in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine. According to him, there were 1.5 million tons of grain in the occupied territories. He expressed fears that most of this grain could be stolen by the russians.