Russian negotiators over accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO) plan to hold talks with the Georgian officials this week to clarify Tbilisi’s position over Russia's WTO accession, Maksim Medvedko, negotiator from the Russian Ministry of Economy told RIA Novosti on March 21.

On February 21 Georgian Deputy Foreign Minister Valeri Chechelashvili met with Ambassadors of the WTO member states accredited in Georgia and outlined Tbilisi’s position over Russia’s WTO accession.

Georgia will support Russia’s WTO membership only if Moscow helps Tbilisi restore control over the Roki Tunnel, which links Georgia’s breakaway South Ossetia with the Russian Federation, as well as control over the Adleri-Leselidze border checkpoint with Russia - in breakaway Abkhazia.

The Georgian side also demands that Russia intensifies the fight against falsified Georgian products - mainly wine - on the Russian market, as well as gives up the practice of unilaterally banning imports of  the Georgian agricultural products. A similar position by Tbilisi was outlined by Georgian Economy Minister Irakli Chogovadze at the WTO Ministerial Conference in Hong Kong in December, 2005.

Tbilisi claims that all these demands are economically-motivated.

But Russian negotiator Maksim Medvedkov said that Georgia’s demands have nothing to do with WTO.

“It is clear that all these issues are beyond WTO’s competencies… It would have been ridiculous to push those issues at the WTO which have no direct links to WTO,” Maksim Medvedkov said.