EU to Serbia: Russian market is ours

EU to Serbia: Russian market is ours

BRUSSELS -- The EU expects candidates for membership not take advantage of Russia's counter-sanctions by taking the place of EU food exporters to the Russian market.

This includes Serbia and in particular Turkey - as well as Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Switzerland - the Beta news agency is reporting.

This was made clear last Friday by EU foreign ministers, although, speaking from a purely international legal point of view, candidate countries cannot be asked to prevent their companies and food exporters who would like to meet the growing demand of their Russian partners, the agency was told by sources at the European Commission in Brussels.

Officials in the Commission wanted to emphasize that this was "more a question of morality and solidarity" with the EU, noting that EU ministers said the goal of European sanctions against Russia was to "urgently achieve a political, sustainable solution" to the Ukrainian crisis.

And, as they explained, "to ensure the unity of the international community and to maintain international law, the European Union expects third countries and candidates to refrain from making use of the new trade opportunities that opened up with the introduction of these measures."

After a series of western sanctions aimed against it, Russia earlier this month decided to respond by banning for one year food imports from the EU, the U.S, and several other countries.

Analyses offered by the media and EU officials concluded that "the somewhat unexpected Russian counter-sanctions" will cause damages worth "several hundred million" to EU producers, so calculations have also been made about where Russia could find replacements for the food it...