Russian forces did this to cause famine, a Ukrainian official said
By Diego Flammini
Staff Writer
Farms.com
The Russian army targeted a grain storage facility in Ukraine to create hunger challenges, a Ukrainian official alleges.
“Russian occupation forces are deliberately taking measures to cause a famine in Ukraine,” Lyudmyla Denisova, Ukraine’s ombudswoman for human rights, said in a Facebook post on Monday.
The storage facility belongs to Golden AGRCO LLC in Rubezhnoye, Denisova’s post says.
The location includes a drain dryer with 1,500 tons of capacity, an elevator with 30,000 tons of storage, equipment and other materials.
The targeting of these facilities violates “Article 55 of the 1949 Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War,” she wrote.
Article 55 of the Geneva Convention states, “to the fullest extent of the means available to it, the Occupying Power (Russia) has the duty of ensuring the food and medical supplies of the population; it should, in particular, bring in the necessary foodstuffs, medical stores and other articles if the resources of the occupied territory are inadequate.”
Denisova’s social media post came on the same day Emine Dzheppar, Ukraine’s deputy foreign affairs minister, posted a video of the alleged missile strike.
The 11-second video shows a projectile hitting close to a building and exploding. Farm equipment can be seen in the bottom corner of the video.
“Russian occupiers shelled warehouse with grain in Dnipropetrovsk region,” she said on Twitter. “Invaders deliberately hit agricultural enterprises and warehouses in Ukraine.”
Russian forces are also accused of stealing Ukrainian grain.
Ukraine has about 1.5 million metric tons of grain in storage, which could be at risk from Russian theft.
“I personally hear this from many silo owners in the occupied territory. This is outright robbery. And this is happening everywhere in occupied territory,” said Mykola Solskyi, Ukraine’s agriculture minister, Reuters reported. "There will soon be a wheat harvest in the south. But farmers in this situation may well say: 'Here are the keys to the tractor - go collect it yourself, if you want'.”
Russia has denied the grain theft allegations.