Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova made her comments in a statement issued after a wave of Ukrainian strikes on Russia's Black Sea port of Novorossiysk which killed three, including a child, and forced major grain terminals in the city to stop working.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy confirmed the attacks on Novorossiysk, saying drones, cruise missiles and maritime drones had been used.
Zakharova said: "It is evident that the Kyiv regime's cynical military campaign to incite chaos in the global food market ... serves the interests of certain Western nations."
"All this exacerbates the shortage of grain and fertilisers, fuels the rise in global food prices, and increases the burden on the countries of the Global South and East, which are being held hostage by the irresponsible policies of the aforementioned 'players'," Zakharova said.
In a later post on X, Zelenskiy said the "unique operation" targeted the naval base in Novorossiysk, which he said is "the last major stronghold of the Russian fleet in the Black Sea, more than 300 kilometres from the front line".
Ukraine has this northern hemisphere summer escalated its strikes on Russian economic infrastructure it says underpins the country's military campaign against it, including striking agricultural export infrastructure.
Russia is the world's largest wheat exporter.
Russian strikes on ships in the Black Sea have also drastically reduced grain shipments from Ukraine, which is also a major grain exporter.
Shipments tumbled 76 per cent in the first two weeks of August, versus the same period last year, Ukraine's agriculture ministry said.
Grain futures spiked on Wednesday, after the Ukrainian strikes on Novorossiysk.
Meanwhile, Russia's human rights commissioner published a list of 224 Ukrainian prisoners of war that she said Russia was ready to exchange but that Ukraine had rejected.
Thousands of prisoners have been exchanged since the start of the full-scale war in February 2022.
An agreement in May to swap a further 1000 captives each was one of the main tangible results of US-brokered peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine.
A number of exchanges have taken place since then but on Monday "I Want to Find," a Ukrainian government-backed project that tracks the status of captured or killed Russian soldiers, accused Russia of excluding from exchange lists POWs from Russian-held territory in Ukraine.
Denying the allegation in a video statement, Russian human rights commissioner Yana Lantratova said Russia did not discriminate against those from Russian-held parts of Ukraine's Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
"For our part, we are ready for an exchange," she said in a statement, saying Russia had proposed three different lists of potential candidates for a swap to Ukraine over the past month.
"But Ukraine is refusing to take back its own citizens."
Her statement linked to a list of 224 Ukrainians she said the government in Ukraine had most recently declined to exchange.
Ukraine's parliamentary commissioner for human rights Dmytro Lubinets said the claim that Ukraine had rejected proposed swaps was "cynical lies".
"Ukraine is always committed to bringing back every one of its citizens - and works toward this goal every day," he said on the Telegram messaging app on Wednesday.
Neither side publishes comprehensive figures for the number of prisoners of war it holds and both accuse the other of abuses.
with DPA
