MOSCOW, September 22 (RIA Novosti) – Kiev has sent all the documents needed to continue talks on the return of the products of major Ukrainian candy maker Roshen to the Russian market, the UNIAN news agency reported Sunday.
“We have sent all the materials they wanted, and now the ball is on their side,” the agency cited Ukraine’s First Deputy Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food Ivan Bisyuk as saying.
The head of Russia’s consumer rights watchdog Rospotrebnadzor, Gennady Onishchenko, said last week Russia did not receive the documents it had requested from Ukraine.
“This work has stalled. We can only read the pompous statements of [Ukrainian] producers claiming victory over Russia,” Onishchenko told reporters in Moscow on Friday.
In late July, Russia banned imports from Roshen after the carcinogen benzopyrene, which can naturally occur in roasted coffee and cocoa beans, was found in analyzed product samples.
Rospotrebnadzor said that products from Roshen factories in Kiev, Vinnitsa, Mariupol and Kremenchug violated Russian standards for quality and food safety.
The move came on the backdrop of recent differences between Ukraine and Russia over Kiev’s additional import tax on cars that Russia believes would be harmful for its carmakers.
