Blinken sees no comparable alternatives to Black Sea grain initiative

NEW YORK. Aug 4 (Interfax) - The United States administration is working on alternative routes for the export of Ukrainian agricultural products, but still considers such options to be an inadequate replacement of the Black Sea grain initiative, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Thursday.

"It will be very difficult to make up what we were doing [...] with the Black Sea Grain Initiative. In other words, the volumes, I think, will be hard to match," Blinken told reporters at the UN headquarters.

Washington is working on alternative routes: by land, river and sea, he added.

For his part, Russia's Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN Dmitry Polyansky told the UN Security Council on Thursday that Russia would be ready to return to the initiative if the agreements concerning Russia are fulfilled.

"I repeat once again: if all of the problems we highlighted publicly, including in this room, the problems that arose with the implementation of the Russia-UN memorandum, are removed, we will be ready to resume our participation in the Black Sea initiative," Polyansky said.