Medvedev compares EU-Ukraine economic cooperation to neocolonialism
MOSCOW. Dec 15 (Interfax) - Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has dubbed the EU policy for Ukraine as "diktat" and compared principles sought by the European Union in economic collaboration with Kyiv to "neocolonialism."
"Every move Ukraine is due to take in practically every sphere of life is dictated to it in detail. And this is not a small European country with a population of several millions but one of the largest countries of the continent," Medvedev wrote in his opinion piece, "Russia and Ukraine: Living by New Rules", published by Nezavisimaya Gazeta on Monday.
The publication was timed to coincide with an anniversary of the Ukrainian crisis.
"This position is clearly reflected by the Association Agreement with the EU," Medvedev pointed out. "In fact, an absolute priority of European norms and directives over national laws and, besides, over national interests is being established."
He cited as an example the duty of Ukraine to adopt a restitution law, "which might cause a complete confusion in property issues."
"Not only citizens of Ukraine but also many citizens of Russia, Poland and other states to whom property had belonged before 1940 would be able to make property claims," Medvedev said.
"In the context of economic cooperation, the EU attitude towards Ukraine looks like neocolonialism," the premier stated.
"The EU needs Ukraine as a supplier of certain resources in the first place. Naturally, this will also be a market for European companies," he said.
"A significant number of Ukrainian enterprises will be unable to compete on their own market with European goods, an influx of which will begin amid the liberal trade regime," the Russian premier stated.
"Tariff liberalization, which will be effective for up to 98% of European commodities, will result in the gradual forcing of rivals from the Ukrainian market by European products. And the second wave of the European trade "tsunami" will carry that volume to markets of Customs Union member countries and deteriorate business conditions in the Customs Union," Medvedev wrote.
"Certainly, we will not be detached observers in that process. We will take retaliatory measures, which will result in a drastic decline in Ukrainian exports to Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan," the prime minister warned.
"In that case, Kyiv may incur losses of up to $15 billion," Medvedev said.
The agrarian sector of Ukraine has the worst prospects, as the Association Agreement "creates a discriminative system of quotas which is totally inconsistent with the free trade zone principles," Medvedev said.
According to him, Ukraine will be able to export only 50% of its wheat to the EU without export duties, and the rest will be subject to a duty of 95 euro per tonne, which will increase the price of Ukrainian wheat by at least 1.5 times.
The cost of Ukrainian transformations estimated by the Yanukovych government at 160 to 500 billion euro within a decade may be overstated, Medvedev said. "But allocations have to be very large in any case. It would be naive to expect their compensation by the European Union," the Russian premier emphasized.
