Brussels has warned EU candidate countries against exploiting the Russian embargo on EU food imports to their own advantage.
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A meeting of EU foreign ministers on Friday said it expected candidate countries - of which Serbia is one - to "refrain from measures aimed at exploiting new trading opportunities arising from the introduction of these [Russian] measures".


Comment: In other words, you don't even have to be a EU member for them to threaten you.


BIRN has learned that the wording of the formulation especially related to Serbia, because of its close ties to Russia and special trading agreement.

Serbian officials have made no secret of their wish to boost exports to Russia, now that the Kremlin has banned imports of food from the EU.

Serbia has resisted Western pressure to impose sanctions on Russia on account of the Kemlin's perceived role in separatist fighting in Ukraine. It has adopted a neutral stance on the crisis in Ukraine.


Under a free-trade deal between Serbia and Russia signed in August 2000, goods produced in Serbia are subject only to a 1-per-cent tarriff.

A senior EU high official told BIRN it expected compliance from Belgrade. "We expect Serbia to comply with our decisions as the country seek membership of the Union," he said.

"We expect compliance with our foreign policy, which at the moment includes sanctions on Russia, and at the same time we expect solidarity," he added.


Comment: Which at the moment includes sanctions based on imaginary claims which end up backfiring on EU members and support for the Nazis in Ukraine and it's genocide against the people of eastern Ukraine.


"We will certainly address this in our upcoming progress report [on Serbia], where we will once more underline that we expect Serbia to fully adopt EU foreign policy," the same source continued.

President Vladimir Putin announced a "full embargo" on food imports from the EU, the US and other Western countries in response to sanctions imposed over Ukraine on August 7.

Serbian Chamber of Commerce data show that Serbian food exports to Russia in 2014 rose by 68 per cent compared to the previous year.

They were worth $117 million in the first six months of 2014, well up on the figures for 2013, when food exports to Russia were worth $185 million for the entire year.

Serbian exports made up only a small fraction of Russia's total foreign food needs, however. In 2013, Russia imported about $42 billion worth food and agricultural products.

Experts believe that Serbia has a chance to increase its exports to Russia of fruit, vegetables, meat products, dairy products and alcoholic beverages.

The embargo already increased the demands for Serbia's fruit and dairy from Russian companies.

"We are receiving calls from new buyers from Russia all the time," Vilmos Fogas, a farmer from the province of Vojvodina, told the media.

"If we could produce three times more apples, we could sell them all," Fogas said, adding that at this moment larger production of fruit is not possible.

The owners of the Kuc dairy factory in central Serbia said they had received requests for products from 50 Russian companies in the last five days alone.

"Demand compared to last year has increased by more than 100 percent," Mirjana Dudic, from Kuc, told Serbia's Tanjug news agency.

Serbia's Chamber of Commerce on Friday sent Russian counterparts a list of factories and producers that are ready to increase production in order to meet the demands of Russian market.

In 2013, Russia was Serbia's fourth-largest importer of goods from Serbia, behind Italy, Germany and Bosnia.