Europe Parliament Blocks $1 Billion in Food Aid to Soviets, Cites Baltics
The European Parliament blocked $1 billion in food aid to the Soviet Union today in a sharp reprimand of the Kremlin for its crackdown in the Baltics.
A $500-million technical aid program for the Soviet Union also may be reconsidered, said the Parliament’s budget committee chairman, Alain Lamassoure of France.
The assembly will reconsider the food aid in late February but will release it only if Moscow relaxes its repression of pro-independence movements in Lithuania and Latvia, he told reporters.
“The repression in the Baltics has made impossible an immediate decision by the Parliament,” he said.
The aid includes $300 million in emergency food shipments and $650 million in credits for food purchases.
Small food deliveries have already been made. But officials said the food shipments were not due to begin in earnest until next month.
The EC’s 518-seat Parliament is largely an advisory body, but it has final authority over some EC spending, including most aid for areas outside the trade bloc.
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