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December 21st, 2013 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda Russia has not ruled out the possibility of Ukraine remaining a signatory to a free trade agreement of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) if Kiev signs trade deals with the European Union.
“We were saying that under the circumstances when a free trade area was being created between Ukraine and the EU, it was impossible to keep in place favorable treatment existing between us in the framework of the CIS free trade area. But, it doesn’t mean we would impose sanctions against Ukraine. We would just get back to conventional rules called a regime of the most favorable treatment,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in an interview with Russian news agency RIA Novosti on Friday.
“A free trade area gives us discounts in excess of this regime. That’s it. But saying that it was incompatible at the time we didn’t mean it was impossible in general,” Lavrov added.
Eight CIS states — Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, and Ukraine — are signatories to the regional free trade agreement, which exempts a number of goods from import and export duties. The other CIS states of Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan did not sign the agreement that was reached in 2011.
He expressed readiness to discuss a free trade agreement between the EU and Ukraine at a meeting in Brussels at the end of January 2014.
“We’ll be ready for it. We were ready for it before, amid the tensions in Ukraine. Everything will depend on EU readiness to solve the problem taking into consideration the best interests of Russia and member countries of the EU’s Eastern Partnership Project,” Lavrov said.
The Russian foreign minister also stated that the proposal, suggested by Ukrainian officials, for holding a tripartite meeting between Russia, Ukraine and the EU, was a good idea.
“The proposal to hold trilateral consultations in order to fairly consider trade terms existing between Russia and Ukraine, Ukraine and the EU, Russia and the EU, hiding nothing from each other and without trying to deceive one another, was a very good one. [Russian] President [Vladimir] Putin backed it immediately, but the EU rejected it or European officials rejected it,” Lavrov stated.
He said in conclusion, “When I was in Brussels a week ago and met all the 28 EU foreign ministers, some of them said that the proposal of trilateral consultations was a good one. They said it was a right and constructive way, not the confrontational one. And I reiterate that the proposal of consultations is a good one.”
On Tuesday, Russia and Ukraine reached a strategic economic and trade agreement under which Kiev is given significant discounts on imported Russian gas and billions of dollars in credit.
Under the deal, the Kremlin will buy $15 billion worth of Ukrainian government bonds from the National Welfare Fund, Putin said on Tuesday after trade talks with his Ukrainian counterpart Viktor Yanukovych in Moscow.
Moscow will also reduce the price of gas sold to Ukraine by about one-third, and improve work conditions for Ukrainians working in Russia.
The deal was signed amid mass demonstrations in the Ukrainian capital Kiev, with protesters fuming over Yanukovych’s decision to scrap the trade deal with the EU in late November.
MSM/MAM/MHB
Source Article from http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2013/12/21/341071/ukraine-may-remain-in-cis-trade-deal/
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