Ukraine bans Russian foods as trade war escalates
Russia strongly opposed the free trade pact and says its ban on Ukrainian imports is necessary to protect its own internal markets.
Russian officials have also described the embargo as retaliation for Ukraine joining European economic sanctions designed to punish Russia for annexing Crimea and supporting the separatist war effort in eastern Ukraine.
Russia has imposed identical retaliatory embargoes on Western food products, closing its markets to cheese, meat, fish, and almost all fruit and vegetables from North America, the EU, Norway, and Australia.
Ukraine was originally due to sign an association agreement with the European Union in November 2013, but Viktor Yanukovych, the then president of Ukraine, backed out under pressure from Russia.
The U-turn sparked massive street protests in Kyiv that eventually snowballed into a revolution which ousted Mr Yanukovych in February 2014. The country’s parliament finally approved the association agreement in September the same year.
The Russian government denounced the revolution as a western-sponsored coup, and responded by annexing Crimea and fuelling an armed separatist uprising in eastern Ukraine.