Agro Perspectiva

Poroshenko: Ukraine stands for mutual liberalization of trade with Russia

21.06.2012 12:40 "Agro Perspectiva" (Kyiv) — Ukraine stands for the intensification of trade and economic cooperation with Russia and mutual liberalization of trade, the economic development and trade minister of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko said during the working meeting with the deputy foreign minister of Ukraine of the Russian Federation Grigory Karasin and the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Russian Federation Mikhail Zurabov, ForUm learned from the economic development and trade ministry press office. «The effective economic cooperation between the states will strengthen the strategic partnership between Ukraine and the Russian Federation and will allow reaching a new level of mutually advantageous cooperation,» Poroshenko said. The parties discussed the condition and the prospects of the economic cooperation between the states, as well as a wide range of issues on deepening bilateral cooperation and building up trade relations. Poroshenko stressed the need for mutual liberalization of trade, which will increase the efficiency of the bilateral cooperation between Ukraine and Russia. The meeting was focused on the potential for cooperation in the aviation and transport engineering. The parties also noted that the performance of the agreement between the governments of Ukraine and the Russian Federation on the production and scientific-technical cooperation between the defense field enterprises will have a positive impact on the bilateral cooperation. The meeting was held within the framework of preparation for the meeting of the Russian-Ukrainian Interstate Commission’s Committee on Economic Cooperation, scheduled for June 27 this year. As a reminder, on October 18, 2011 in St. Petersburg (Russia), the Prime Ministers of the CIS member states signed the agreement establishing a free trade area. The agreement on FTA was signed by Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Armenia, Tajikistan, Moldova and Kyrgyzstan. The contract was not signed by Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. However, it was stated that these countries plan to join this agreement. The agreement will go into effect 30 days upon the date of receipt by the depositary of the third notice on the implementation by the signatory Parties of internal procedures necessary for its entry into force. However, now some comments on the agreement on FTA within the CIS aroused in Ukraine, in particular, relating to the inequality of conditions relating to the imposition of trade restrictions by the Customs Union countries and the other members of the Commonwealth. The Parliament of Ukraine has not ratified the agreement yet. On April 2, the Russian President Dmitri Medvedev signed a law on ratification of the agreement on FTA within the CIS.