Medvedev announces Russian ban on Ukrainian goods:
By RFE/RL's Russian Service
Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has announced a ban on Ukrainian goods, including agricultural and industrial products, days after adding Ukrainian firms and individuals to Russia's sanctions list.
Posting on his Twitter page on December 29, Medvedev said the Russian action was a "retaliatory measure against Ukrainian restrictions."
Relations between Ukraine and Russia have plummeted since Moscow's annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in March 2014 and its subsequent support for separatists in eastern Ukraine, where some 10,300 have been killed in fighting since April 2014.
Kyiv has imposed sanctions on Russian citizens and companies, a course of action also taken by the European Union and United States.
On December 25, Medvedev said he had signed a decree expanding the sanctions list by some 200 individuals and legal entities to "defend the interests of the Russian state, companies, and citizens of Russia."
On November 1, Russia imposed "special economic measures" against 322 Ukrainian individuals and 68 companies. The sanctions included freezing of noncash accounts and other assets in Russia and a ban on capital transfers from Russia.
Among the individuals on the original list were Interior Minister Arsen Avakov, Security Service chief Vasyl Hrytsak, former Prime Ministers Yulia Tymoshenko and Arseniy Yatsenyuk, Crimean Tatar leader Mustafa Dzhemilev, and former Right Sector leader Dmytro Yarosh.
The list is based on an October 22 decree by President Vladimir Putin. Putin said at the time that the punitive measures could be canceled if Ukraine lifted all restrictions it had imposed against Russian citizens and companies. (w/TASS)