US accuses Russia of weaponizing food in Ukraine war
By EDITH M. LEDERER
Associated Press
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is accusing Russia of weaponizing food and holding grain for millions of people around the world hostage in order to help accomplish what its invasion of Ukraine has not — “to break the spirit of the Ukrainian people.” He told a U.N. Security Council meeting Thursday that the war has halted maritime trade in large areas of the Black Sea and made the region unsafe for navigation, trapping Ukrainian agricultural exports and jeopardizing global food supplies. Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia blamed Ukraine — not Russia — for blocking 75 vessels and mining waterways.
