In a post on social media on Saturday, American historian Timothy Snyder said that Russian President Vladimir Putin plans to starve Asians and Africans to win the war in Ukraine. Russia has blocked Ukraine’s grain exports by blocking Ukrainian ports since the start of the offensive on February 24.

Snyder is a professor specializing in Central and Eastern Europe at Yale University. The warning that millions of people could die of hunger as a result of the Russian blockade was also made by the Italian Foreign Minister Luigi di Maio.

According to Snyder, Ukraine is the fifth largest exporter of wheat, the fourth largest exporter of corn and the largest exporter of sunflower oil.

Russia is also an important grain producer, but cannot export due to Western sanctions. Countries together produce one-third of the world’s wheat.

“The Russian blockade of the port in Odessa, the destruction of silos and agricultural equipment hinders the export of the crop, which is mainly sent to countries in Africa and the Middle East,” Snyder wrote on Twitter.

According to the historian, Putin’s strategy takes place on three levels:

• Destroy the Ukrainian state by cutting off its exports;
• to create a wave of refugees from North Africa and the Middle East, who are dependent on Ukraine’s exports and will destabilize the European Union;
• Start a Russian propaganda campaign to blame Ukraine for world hunger.

The horror of Putin’s famine plan is so great we find it difficult to understand. We also tend to forget how central food is to politics.
Timothy Snyder says Putin has ‘hunger plan’

Last week, Macky Sall, the Senegalese leader and current African Union chief, said that without Ukrainian grain exports, Africa would be “in a state of very serious famine that could destabilize the continent.”

The African continent is very dependent on grain imports from Ukraine and Russia, as well as fertilizers necessary for its low-yield agriculture.

“In most African countries, if fertilizers don’t arrive in winter (rainy season), it means there will be no harvest,” Sall said.