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RF to take tit-for-tat action to US new anti-Russia law.

Moscow would be forced to take retaliatory measures, - warned RF presidential aide Yuri Ushakov

MOSCOW, May 29 (Itar-Tass) — If the United States adopts a new anti-Russian law, Moscow would be forced to take retaliatory measures, warned RF presidential aide Yuri Ushakov.

“If the new anti-Russian law (Magnitsky Act) is passed, certainly, this law should be met with our tit-for-tat response,” the Kremlin official told reporters.

At the same time Ushakov stressed: “We would like to avoid it. We would like to hope very much that the anti-Soviet amendment (Jackson-Vanik) will not be changed to an anti-Russian law.”

The Russian presidential aide believes that the Jackson-Vanik amendment that is still in effect in America’s current legislation “would be more disadvantageous for the Americans, as their companies may find themselves in a losing situation on the Russian market, compared with the competitors from Europe and Asia.” “We have become accustomed to the Jackson-Vanik amendment, we know how to deal with it,” Ushakov said.

The US Congress has drafted a bill providing for sanctions against the persons allegedly responsible for the death of lawyer Sergei Magnitsky. The initiator of the bill, known as “Sergei Magnitsky Rule Of Law Accountability Act,” is Democratic Senator Benjamin Cardin. The bill provides for sanctions against officers of Russian law enforcement agencies and judges implicated in the death of the lawyer of the Hermitage Capital Management investment fund in a Moscow detention centre in November 2009. According to the document, they and their relatives will be denied entry to the United States and their accounts in US banks will be frozen. Many members of the US Congress, including Senators Kerry and Cardin, consider the adoption of the Magnitsky Act as a prerequisite for the repeal of the discriminatory Jackson-Vanik amendment for Russia. The Obama administration has opposed such condition.