Ukraine may revise FTA with EU after consultations with Russia - Yanukovych
KYIV. Nov 27 (Interfax) - A free trade agreement between Ukraine and the European Union initialed in July 2012 may be revised following consultations with Russia, Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych said.
"Our experts have come to the conclusion that, considering the speed with which these documents were drawn up, some mistakes were made, and they need to be revisited," Yanukovych said in an interview with leading Ukrainian TV channels shown on Wednesday.
Yanukovych said he had discussed the issue at his last meetings with the Russian president, who had repeatedly claimed that Ukrainian-EU free trade was a threat to Russia, which accounts for about 30% of Ukrainian exports.
"Then we probably need to step back a little bit and look at the free trade agreement with the EU to see what goes against our relations in this agreement and what violates our relations there," Yanukovych said in describing his agreements with Putin.
"We should have an answer on all of these positions to see what customs rates are and what products fall under protection," Yanukovych said.
The EU set the same terms to Ukraine, Yanukovych said. "If we conduct any negotiations with Russia and they concern a free trade area, please, these actions should be coordinated with us," he said citing EU officials.
Yanukovych emphasized that the CIS free trade agreement should be revised before its signature.
Ukraine signed a CIS free trade agreement in October 2011, and it took effect in September 2012. Then Foreign Minister Kostyantyn Hryshchenko insisted that both Brussels and the key EU members assured Ukraine clearly that the CIS free trade agreement would not prevent Kyiv from signing an association agreement, including a free trade agreement, with the EU.
Then Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko said at the time that the CIS free trade agreement made it impossible for Kyiv to sign a free trade agreement with the EU.
As the Eastern Partnership summit in Vilnius slated for November 2013 was drawing near, at which Ukraine was supposed to sign an association agreement with the EU, Moscow was saying increasingly more often that it would have to phase out its free trade with Ukraine and even took some practical steps by toughening customs clearance procedures for Ukrainian goods.
The CIS free trade agreement's Appendix 6 stipulates that sanctions may be imposed on signatories concluding free trade agreements with third countries or associations and so altering the structure of their imports.
The EU has said repeatedly that the association agreement with Ukraine does not economically threaten Russia in any way. In particular, European Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighborhood Policy Stefan Fule said earlier this week that Russia had no economic grounds to make any decisions, as the EU did not see any negative consequences in the association agreement for trade and economic relations between Russia and Ukraine.