Ukraine temporarily halts imports of milk, pork from Belarus
KYIV. Mar 1 (Interfax) - Ukraine's state veterinary and phytosanitary service has temporarily suspended the import of Belarusian dairy product, livestock susceptible to African swine fever, and product derived from it.
The service issued a press release Wednesday saying that such Belarusian product had not been in compliance with Ukraine's veterinary-sanitary requirements this in February. In particular, there was detected an excess of veterinary drugs in dairy product from Belarus. "This is evidence of systemic violations and insufficient control on the part of the Belarusian agency over the use of veterinary preparations and the observance by Belarusian enterprises of importer-country requirements," the press service said.
Furthermore, the Ukrainian service said that hogs were seized from private households in the Neznanovo Novograd district of Grodno Region and destroyed on February 16. According to a statement issued by the Belarusian Agriculture Ministry and the department for veterinary and food oversight, these actions were taken in the battle against African swine fever.