The Russian Federation some time ago, followed all the rules for transition to a visa-free regime with the EU, from a technical point of view everything was ready, but in Brussels took the negative position long before the Ukrainian fall, said the head of the Ministry of foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation Sergei Lavrov, speaking in the state Duma.

"You know, what is the position of the EU regarding the old project of the document on refusal from visa requirements. It, roughly speaking, samuraii in the European Union, also took a negative position long before the Ukrainian crisis broke out, for this reason, we have here the illusion was not. This very small but very aggressive minority in the EU demanded not to sign the agreement on the abolition of visas between Russia and the European Union before the first visa-free regime from EU will get to Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, these rules were extended. Although the position of the real technical we were ready with the European Union, we met all of the consensus for all four baskets, which had to settle for a transition to visa-free regime, for this reason, this question rests not in us, we spoke about this back in 2003 ", - said the head of the Ministry.

Lavrov said, " as for other countries that as long as we do not have agreements on visa-free regime, we are most importantly dialogues with countries that have good potential for tourism ".

sections: Politics