Report: Russia to think about prolongation of grain deal – Putin

MOSCOW, Jul 13 (PRIME) -- Russia still has a couple of days to think about prolongation of the Black Sea Grain Initiative, President Vladimir Putin said in an interview to Rossiya 24 television channel broadcast on Thursday.

“We will think about it, there are still a couple of days left. We will think about what we should do,” he said.

One of the options is for Russia to withdraw from the deal until its demands are fulfilled.

“We can suspend our participation in the deal. They are all again saying that all the promises will be fulfilled. Let them do it, and we will immediately join the deal again,” Putin said.

Nevertheless, no Russian conditions have been met in spite of several Moscow’s goodwill gestures in the form of repeated prolongations. The U.N. and Secretary General Antonio Guterres are actually doing their best to make the Western countries comply with the grain deal conditions that apply to Russia, but the West is not willing to fulfill its promises, Putin said.

He also said that he was yet to see Guterres’ letter with his proposals on the deal.

Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russia was yet to make a final decision on the matter.

Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Vershinin said earlier that Moscow would pursue ending the deal, while Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that there were no arguments in favor of prolonging the deal, because Russia's conditions were not met.

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