MOSCOW, June 25. /ITAR-TASS/. Russia will hold a meeting with the European Union and Ukraine in July to discuss risks of an association agreement between EU and Ukraine for the Russian economy. Russia’s Economic Development Minister Alexei Ulyukayev said this on Wednesday.

“A three-party meeting of the EU, Ukraine and Russia is expected to take place at the ministerial level in July. EU Trade Commissioner Karel de Gucht, Ukrainian Economy Minister Pavel Sheremet and I will meet to discuss risks that will emerge over the implementation of this agreement and possible measures to offset these risks,” Ulyukayev told ITAR-TASS.

Ukraine is expected to sign the economic part of its association agreement with the EU on June 27. The political part of the deal was signed in April this year.

At the forthcoming three-party talks, Russia will propose discussing two groups of problems, Ulyukayev said.

“The first group relates to additional risks of uncontrolled imports due to the introduction of European technical regulations and the problem of imports from third countries,” the Russian economics minister said.

Russia expects the EU and Kiev to guarantee that there will be “no re-imports from third countries through some customs protection measures and perhaps they will jointly reform the Ukrainian customs system to help remove the risk,” Ulyukayev said.

The second group of problems relates to a large number of agreements between Ukraine, Russia and other CIS countries, in particular, agreements on technical regulation, veterinary control and pharmacology, i.e. the agreements dealing with citizens’ safety and health,” the minister said.

“We should discuss how Ukraine will withdraw from these agreements or remain a party to them. These are two blocks of issues, which we’ll raise before our colleagues. They say we exaggerate risks. They need to prove that our perceptions of these risks are unfounded,” Ulyukayev said.

A source of ITAR-TASS in the European Commission earlier said that the EU had proposed holding a three-party ministerial meeting with Russia and Ukraine in early July on the implementation of the free trade deal between Kiev and Brussels. It was suggested that the meeting should discuss practical issues of the implementation of the free trade deal making part of the economic section of the EU-Ukraine association agreement in the context of its impact on trade between Russia and Ukraine.

Russia and the EU have held two rounds of bilateral technical consultations on these issues since the start of the year.