You're reading: Free trade area agreement with EU will not be postponed – Klimkin

The implementation of the part of the EU-Ukraine association agreement on a free trade area between Ukraine and the EU will not be postponed, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin has said.

“The decision that a number of provisions on the free trade area will be implemented starting from January 1 (2016) has been taken, and no one will put it off,” he said on 1+1 TV channel on April 23 evening, adding that Ukrainian producers were already preparing to enter EU markets.

Klimkin said “as regards the association agreement, not a single word in the agreement will be changed, either now or in the future.”

As reported, on September 29, 2014, the EU General Affairs Council postponed for a year – until January 1, 2016 – the application of the provisions of the Association Agreement with Ukraine on the creation of a free trade area. This was the result of tripartite consultations held between Ukraine, Russia and the EU on September 12, 2014.

EU Commissioner for European Neighborhood and Enlargement Negotiations Johannes Hahn had previously said that the European Union had been active and open to discussing potential Russian concerns over the EU-Ukraine Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area of the Association Agreement, but ruled out revising the agreement.

Head of the EU Delegation to Ukraine Jan Tombinski later said that the European Union was not considering any further postponement or review of the implementation of the free trade area agreement with Ukraine.

Ukraine is preparing for the implementation of the part of the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement dealing with the establishment of a free trade area with the EU starting from January 1, 2016, Deputy Foreign Minister of Ukraine for European Integration Olena Zerkal said.

“We are preparing for the beginning of the implementation of the part (of the Association Agreement with the EU), which deals with the formation of a free trade area starting from January 1, 2016. At the same time, we are creating the necessary legal framework so that the part that concerns the free trade area will work from the very beginning,” she told reporters in Kyiv on April 23.