You're reading: Free trade deal with EU to come into effect despite Russian threats to impose embargo on Ukrainian goods

Prime Minister of Ukraine Arseniy Yatsenyuk has said that the Agreement on a Free Trade Area (FTA) with the European Union will come into force in early 2016 despite Russia's threats to impose an embargo on Ukrainian goods.

“Anyway, the free trade agreement will be signed from Jan. 1, 2016. Russia said that it will introduce embargo for Ukrainian goods in such a case. That’s why I want to inform Russia first of all that the agreement will take effect,” Yatsenyuk said at a joint press briefing with Lithuanian Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevicius in Kyiv on Aug. 28.

According to him, a Russia embargo “would become an embargo for Ukrainian citizens, not for Ukrainian goods.”