MOSCOW. Dec 17 (Interfax-AVN) - Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin and his Ukrainian counterpart Yuriy Boiko have agreed on documents to develop cooperation in high tech sector.
"We are completing the preparation of documents for the approval of our two presidents. Today I met with the delegation of European industrialists and officials headed by Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Yuriy Boiko. We have gone through the report on aviation, the rocket and space industry, ship building and the motor industry. We have agreed upon the last letters of the protocol. If we agree on all of this, this will be a real chance for Ukraine to restore its power potential, which is either stagnant or has considerably deteriorated," Rogozin said on air of the Ekho Moskvy (Echo of Moscow) radio station on December 16.
These documents are aimed at restoring the industry of Ukraine, while Kyiv signing the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement would lead to complete degradation of Ukrainian industry, Rogozin said.
"The Eastern Partnership is a European policy we have known since the times of the crusaders, everything goes in a circle. Today the crusaders with 'a carrot' are on the defense and we have our proposals for industrial cooperation and a restoration of all that has been lost in the past 20 years," the deputy prime minister said.
As to the situation in Ukraine, the authorities have not explained to their citizens the difference between the Association Agreement with the European Union and joining the EU, Rogozin said. "The association is a way to a queue with no end. You take on obligations [that result in the] complete de-industrialization of the country. In the end Ukraine turns into a country, which can grow grain at best. A third-level European state," he said.
"It has not been explained to them that even if it was not intended to accept them into the EU, they have only been offered [a chance] to stand in the line in the waiting room to the sauna, not to go into the sauna," he said.
Russia is also following a path of rapprochement with the EU and considered the EU to be its strategic partner and itself a part of larger Europe, Rogozin said. "Europe is not some reserve for Russia, where we will never go," he said.
However, Russia should restore its industry prior to deeper cooperation with Europe, Rogozin said.