Russia submits a dispute claim against Ukraine to the WTO
Russia has submitted a dispute case to the World Trade Organization Dispute Settlement body in connection with the sanctions imposed by Ukraine. This was reported by the head of the Ministry of Economic Development of Russia, Maxim Oreshkin, on Saturday, May 20.
"The Russian mission to the WTO in Geneva sent a request to the WTO dispute settlement body and the Government of Ukraine for consultations in connection with the constant restrictions being imposed since 2014, including prohibitions, special requirements and procedures for Russian goods, services and persons in the Ukrainian market, as well as for transit of goods through Ukraine ", he said.
According to Oreshkin, there are reasons to believe that the sanctions imposed against Russia are "in violation of the WTO obligations".
"The Russian claim covers a total of hundreds of elements of Ukrainian regulations and deals with violations of some of the WTO basic Agreements, including the WTO founding agreement, the General Agreement on Trade in Goods, the General Agreement on Trade in Services, the Import Licensing Agreement, the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade, the Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary measures, " he said.
In accordance with WTO procedures, the request for consultation is the first stage in the filing of a lawsuit. Within two months, in accordance with the rules of the World Trade Organization, consultations should be held with the Government of Ukraine with a view to finding a mutually acceptable solution to the current situation.
"In the event that consultations do not produce the expected result, we have the right to commence the second stage of the dispute-the referral of the case to the arbitration group," said Oreshkin.
On May 16, the President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, signed a decree on new sanctions against Russian companies. Under this decree, the Russian social networks of VKontakte, Odnoklassniki, the Mail.Ru group and Yandex are banned from working in Ukraine.