Russian Commercial Policies and the European Union – Can Russia be Anchored in a Legal International Economic Order?

By Brian Hindley, Iana Dreyer

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Can Russia be brought to abide by international commercial rules? In ECIPE’s new Working Paper, Iana Dreyer and Brian Hindley discuss the isolation of Russia from international legal norms. They ask what commercial problems WTO accession could solve, and what the EU should do to support rules-based commercial relations with Russia. The authors argue that governments and businesses should make better use of existing legal agreements, such as the Energy Charter Treaty and the existing bilateral investment treaties with individual member states, which have not been used to their full potential. For the European Union, Russia’s WTO accession should continue to be regarded as a pre-requisite to a new partnership agreement. During the coming negotiations, the EU should consider dropping its usual method of regulatory embrace. It should focus on core market access issues, strong dispute settlement and adoption of international standards for regulation in business and industry.