Exclusive-US-owned company seized to feed Russia planning to supply China, North Korea instead

By Anna Hirtenstein and Alexander Marrow

LONDON (Reuters) -A U.S.-owned canned nutrient institution seized by Russia to safeguard home nutrient supplies is readying to boost dwindling income with exports to China and North Korea, according to documents reviewed by Reuters and radical acquainted with the matter.

Washington has said the attraction of Glavprodukt, the lone U.S. institution Moscow has seized, volition power a planned reset of U.S.-Russia relations which look to person stalled.

Glavprodukt, the largest canned nutrient shaper successful Russia, was founded by Los Angeles-based Leonid Smirnov and seized by the Kremlin successful October 2024. Moscow argued that the institution is of strategical value to Russia's nutrient supply.

Sales person dropped sharply, documents showed. Production has remained astatine akin levels, truthful the oversupply has near the institution trying to find caller markets and summation its warehouse capacity, according to strategy documents and 2 radical acquainted with the matter.

"They claimed they took my institution to unafraid nutrient for Russia. But they are not surviving up to this purpose, this justification," Smirnov told Reuters.

Smirnov is warring successful tribunal to regain his company. The adjacent proceeding is scheduled for July 11 astatine the Moscow Court of Arbitration.

In June, Glavprodukt's caller state-appointed absorption squad projected exporting to caller markets, including North Korea and the Middle East, the documents seen by Reuters showed. They besides sought to summation income to China, a marketplace that made up astir 1 percent of Glavprodukt's income past year.

Glavprodukt's caller absorption did not respond to aggregate emailed requests for comment.

The strategy displacement shows however Russia's commercialized has changed since invading Ukraine. Trade with North Korea, China and different countries that person not imposed sanctions against Russia tin instrumentality spot extracurricular Western influence.

Glavprodukt's pivot appears inconsistent with Vladimir Putin's presumption connected June 27 successful Minsk that helium wants to invited American companies backmost to Russia.

Negotiations betwixt the U.S. and Russia implicit the warfare successful Ukraine person stalled with President Donald Trump expressing disappointment aft a July 3 telephone telephone with Putin.

Separately, relations betwixt the U.S. and China person deteriorated since Trump targeted China with commercialized tariffs, starring to retaliation from Beijing. The 2 countries agreed to a commercialized model past period but the U.S. had said it whitethorn reconstruct tariffs connected Chinese goods successful August.

The Kremlin’s plans for Glavprodukt bespeak Russia's attack to managing foreign-owned assets nether authorities control.