The delegation of Ukraine headed by the Deputy Minister of Economic Development and Trade - Trade Representative of Ukraine Nataliya Mykolska took part in the meeting of the WTO General Council, held on 27^th of July in Geneva.

The General Council meeting, in particular, was focused on the consideration of the issue of trade restrictions being applied by the Russian Federation on the transit of goods from Ukraine.

The Head of the Ukrainian delegation in her speech emphasized on the continuous trade aggression by the Russian Federation and introduction by it of a number of politically motivated measures restricting the Ukrainian trade. In particular, she mentioned further steps of the RF on limitations of the transit of the Ukrainian goods through the territory of the Russian Federation to the countries of the Central Asia, especially the Republic of Kazakhstan and the Kyrgyz Republic.

The delegation of Ukraine drew the attention of the WTO members to the  current actions of the RF aimed at hindering trade in the whole region, which requires collective situation analysis (made by the countries of the region) and corresponding response.

Ukraine once again urged the RF to immediately lift unreasonable transit restrictions and re-establish non-discriminating, open transit treatment for all WTO members.

The position of our state was supported by a number of the WTO members, in particular the EU, the USA, Canada, Japan, Australia, Norway, Georgia, Korea, which emphasized on the necessity of immediate lifting by the Russian Federation of trade barriers and its compliance with the WTO rules.

In addition, at the General Council meeting the WTO members discussed the further implementation of the agreements reached during the last two WTO Ministerial Conferences (in Bali and Nairobi) and current state of multilateral negotiations within the Organization, especially on trade in agricultural goods.