ST. PETERSBURG (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 23rd January, 2020) Israel and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) may sign a free trade agreement as early as in 2021, Zeev Elkin, the Israeli co-chair of the Russian-Israeli Intergovernmental Commission, minister of Jerusalem affairs and minister of environmental protection, told Sputnik stressing that negotiations were on "the finish line."
On Wednesday, co-chairs of the Russian-Israeli Intergovernmental Commission held a meeting ahead of Russian President Vladimir Putin's visit to Israel.
"We seriously discussed provisions of the free trade [agreement] between Israel and the Eurasian Economic Union. We are satisfied to note that that the talks have already reached significant progress and are on the finish line. We should try to complete them by the end of 2020 to sign [the agreement] in 2021. If we manage to do that, we can count on a significant trade increase because, according to our estimations, such a move will significantly boost the business activity," Elkin said on Wednesday.
The EAEU was established in 2014 by Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan to create a single market and facilitate economic relations between the member countries.
