Russian, Indonesian presidents discuss resumption of Ukraine grain deal

By Elena Teslova

MOSCOW (AA) - Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday spoke over the phone with his Indonesian counterpart Joko Widodo and informed him about the resumption of the Ukraine grain deal.

"In the context of ensuring global food security, Vladimir Putin outlined Russia's principled approaches to implementing the Istanbul package agreements regarding the export of Ukrainian grain from the Black Sea ports and unblocking the export of Russian agricultural products and fertilizers to world markets," a Kremlin statement said.

Earlier, the Russian Defense Ministry announced that Moscow is returning to the implementation of the Black Sea grain corridor deal reached this July.

Putin said that Russia had suspended its participation in the deal due to Ukraine's attacks on the infrastructure and its Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol, adding that “after receiving the necessary guarantees from the Ukrainian side that the humanitarian route will not be used for military purposes, Russia resumes the implementation of the grain deal.”

The Russian president also reaffirmed his readiness to provide “significant amounts” of grain to the “poorest countries” free of charge as humanitarian aid, the statement said, adding such an approach was supported by Joko Widodo.

The statement said Widodo initiated the phone call to discuss the upcoming G20 summit that will take place in Bali on Nov.15-16.

"As a follow-up to the agreements reached during the visit of the president of Indonesia to Russia in June 2022 … matters of successfully developing bilateral cooperation were touched upon. The mutual intention to further build mutually beneficial ties in various fields was confirmed," it said.