Lithuania has no evidence that Ukrainian grain from Lithuania is returning to Poland

Vilnius, Lithuania (Svidomi) — Minister of Agriculture Kęstutis Navickas said that his ministry and customs have no evidence that Ukrainian grain is being returned to Poland from Lithuania. Polish farmers used such an argument to start blocking the Polish-Lithuanian border on March 1.  

According to Minister Kęstutis Navickas, Polish farmers have not submitted any complaints or evidence to Lithuania that some of the Ukrainian grain brought to his country is passed off as Lithuanian grain and returned from Lithuania to Poland. The Lithuanian authorities have not recorded any such cases.  

He calls the protests of Polish farmers "an attempt to draw attention to themselves". 

"Blocking an international corridor, which is particularly important for the three Baltic states, will naturally draw a lot of attention, and it's one of the ways to get that attention," Navickas said.  

Lithuania proposed that the Poles send them a list of problems to be solved, but they did not receive such a list. 

Navickas said that more Polish grain is imported to Lithuania than Lithuanian grain is imported to Poland, calling the fears of the neighbouring country's farmers groundless. 

"And in official statistics, our trade ratio, including grain between Lithuania and Poland, is in favour of Poland - we import more Polish grain than we export from Lithuania," the Agriculture Minister said. 

On March 1, Polish protesters plan to block the road at the Kalvarija — Budzisko border crossing on the Polish-Lithuanian border. Earlier, Polish protesters blocked the border with Germany and border crossings with Ukraine. During their actions, they scattered Ukrainian grain in transit through Poland.