Report: New Zealand’s PM support free trade zone talks with Russia

MOSCOW, Mar 12 (PRIME) -- New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has supported Foreign Minister Winston Peters who called for a restart of free-trade zone negotiations with Russia that were suspended in 2014, local daily New Zealand Herald reported on Monday.

Ardern said that New Zealand’s priority is negotiating trade with the E.U., but she also backed negotiations with Russia. “Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has backed Foreign Minister Winston Peters' push for free trade with Russia, saying New Zealand should be looking to be able to trade around sanctions imposed as other countries did,” the daily reported.

Peters told New Zealand Herald previously that New Zealand had hampered trade with Russia as it supported the international sanctions, while other countries, like the E.U. and the U.K., still had “substantial trade” with Russia.

Ardern said Peters stressed that while the sanctions on Russia were in place, other countries had been trading around them.

“New Zealand had applied the spirit of those sanctions, but was subject to non-tariff barriers in Russia. It was seeking to overcome those ‘and just make sure New Zealand is treated fairly in the same way others have traded around the sanctions, as is appropriate’,” the daily reported.

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