Turkish President Erdogan said on Friday that Turkey and Russia have agreed to extend the grain agreement that Putin threatened to end yesterday.
This information is now denied by the Kremlin.
The Kremlin hit back on Friday evening when Erdogan claimed that the grain agreement that Putin had yesterday threatened to leave would be extended, according to The Guardian.
The grain agreement
The grain agreement Black Sea Grain Initiative emerged after mediation by the UN and Turkey.
The background was to alleviate the global food crisis that was aggravated after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The agreement has allowed Ukraine to export grain and other agricultural products across the Black Sea past Russian warships.
The contract expires on Monday.
After the NATO summit, Putin threatened not to extend it.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced on Friday afternoon that Putin has gone against what he said during the meeting and that he has now agreed to extend the grain agreement with Ukraine.
Russian headwind
Instead, Russia believes that an extension of the agreement will only take place if Russia’s demands are met:
– We can end our participation in the settlement, and if everyone says once again that all the promises we have been made will be fulfilled, let them fulfill this promise. Then we will immediately agree to the agreement, Vladimir Putin said on state Russian television, according to Reuters.
A spokesperson for the Russian government clarified that Russia has not yet made an official decision on the matter.
Russia’s demands are, among other things, that the UN should help Russia get its food and fertilizer exports into foreign markets, as they promised before the agreement was written.
Earlier this week, however, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres sent a letter to Putin in which he says he supports removing obstacles to Russia’s fertilizer exports. Putin denies that he received the letter.
According to Erdogan, the letter would ensure the extension of the agreement.