MOSCOW
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova on Tuesday called reports about the establishment of a Russian agricultural bank subsidiary “part of the West’s media campaign” aimed at affecting the completion of the grain deal extension.
In a statement posted on the ministry’s website, Zakharova claimed that the West, UN, and Ukraine have “launched a media campaign” since on the issue of extending the Black Sea Grain Initiative.
“They are trying to create the appearance of some breakthrough results in the normalization of Russian agricultural exports, as provided for by the Russia-UN Memorandum,” she noted.
In reality, she said, no progress has been made with the UN on any aspect of the agreement, including reconnecting the Russian agricultural bank, Rosselkhozbank, to the global financial network.
“Despite all the declarations of Westerners about some alternative ways of exchanging financial messages and attempts by the UN to create an alternative channel between the Rosselkhozbank and the American JP Morgan, there is no real replacement for SWIFT and there cannot be,” she stressed.
Moscow has tied the agreement’s extension to the inclusion of its state-owned Rosselkhozbank in the SWIFT international payment system.
Zakharova criticized the idea of establishing a subsidiary of the bank “which may one day” be connected to the financial network, pointing out that even if the EU agrees, the process of opening the body will take months, and connecting to SWIFT will take three months more.
“In exchange for all this, Russia should already agree to a further extension of the Black Sea Initiative,” she said.
Zakharova said the idea of opening the agricultural bank subsidiary is of the same kind as the resumption of fertilizers deliveries via the Tolyatti-Odesa ammonia pipeline, which was blown up on the territory controlled by Ukraine on June 5.
Türkiye, the UN, Russia, and Ukraine signed the agreement in Istanbul last July to resume grain exports from three Ukrainian Black Sea ports that were halted after the start of the Ukraine war in February last year.
The deal has been renewed several times since then, and it was extended for another two months on May 18, which is set to expire on July 17.
