020851 Moscow Plans to Keep Poultry Ban

MOSCOW (AP) - Despite Russia's elimination of a ban on poultry imported from the United States, Moscow's mayor intends to keep the prohibition in place for his city.

Mayor Yuri Luzhkov said that he intends to maintain the bar on imports of U.S. poultry to the Russian capital even though the federal ministries in charge of food have canceled a nationwide one, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported.

Russian officials had been concerned about the use of additives in poultry that some researchers claimed caused obesity and other medical problems in people. The United States and poultry growers have said that's not the case.

Last week, U.S. trade and agriculture officials agreed to a new veterinary certificate designed to mitigate Russian concerns about poultry production in the United States. The decision ended a five-month impasse between the two nations.

"It is deplorable that the Russian Agriculture and Public Health Ministries made an official decision to permit sales of American poultry on the Russian market again," ITAR-Tass quoted Luzhkov as saying during a trip to the Altai region of Siberia.

The news agency reported that Luzhkov had rejected a demand from the U.S. ambassador to Russia, Alexander Vershbow, to permit a return of poultry imports.

A U.S. Embassy official confirmed that Vershbow had sent a letter a few months ago, responding to some of Luzhkov's comments in the Russian media, but declined to comment on the letter's contents.

RETURN TO HOME PAGE

E-mail: sflanagan@sprintmail.com