Poland to stop supplying weapons to Ukraine over grain row

Poland has announced that it will no longer supply weapons to Ukraine as a diplomatic dispute over grain escalates

Warsaw: Poland has announced that it will no longer supply weapons to Ukraine as a diplomatic dispute over grain escalates.

Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki on Wednesday said that it would instead focus on arming itself with more modern weapons, the BBC reported.

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On Tuesday, Poland summoned Ukraine’s ambassador over comments made by President Volodymyr Zelensky at the UN. He said some nations had feigned solidarity with Ukraine, which Warsaw denounced as “unjustified concerning Poland, which has supported Ukraine since the first days of the war”, the British news broadcaster reported.

Morawiecki announced the decision to no longer supply Ukraine with weapons in a televised address on Wednesday. The grain dispute began after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine all but closed the main Black Sea shipping lanes and forced Ukraine to find alternative overland routes. That in turn led to large quantities of grain ending up in central Europe.

Consequently, the European Union temporarily banned imports of grain into five countries; Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia to protect local farmers, who feared Ukrainian grain was driving down the prices locally, the BBC report explained.

The ban ended on September 15 and the EU chose not to renew it, but Hungary, Slovakia and Poland decided to keep on implementing it, sparking tensions between Warsaw and Kiev.