You're reading: Russia doesn’t plan legislative restrictions on fictitious import from Customs Union – Belousov

The Russian government does not plan to introduce any legislative restrictions on fictitious imports from Kazakhstan and Belarus and capital flight using this scheme, Russian Trade and Economic Development Minister Andrei Belousov told reporters at the ST. Petersburg International Economic Forum.

“We are not talking so much now about legislative restrictions
because all agreements or almost all the agreements were signed at the
level of the Customs Union. There is a need to resolve organizational
issues,” the minister said, responding to a question as to how the
government and the Central Bank plan to fight capital flight using
fictitious imports from Belarus and Kazakhstan, which, according to the
Central Bank estimation, reached some $25 billion (the net flight being
$54 billion) in 2012.

Belousov also said the government is concerned about the inflow of
“gray imports” from China and capital flight through this channel.

“It shows that the customs protection on the Customs Union borders is
flawed. The presence of Russian customs officials on the entire customs
border, including the part located on the territory of Kazakhstan and
Belarus, would be a positive and a very big step. As far as I know, such
agreements have been signed, but organization issues need to be
resolved,” he said.

“As soon as we begin clear work here, including information work, all
these issues will be resolved to a considerable degree. I don’t think
any additional decisions need to be made in the sphere of legislation
here. The issue is the organization and establishment of information
exchange between the Customs Union countries in terms of commodity
flows,” he said.