Russia halted from April 1 the imports of...

In February 2010, Russian steel pipe producers, accounting for over 70% of the domestic steel pipe market, requested the government halt the duty-free imports of pipes from Ukraine starting from the second quarter.

They argued the Russian pipe market had narrowed considerably due to the 2008 global economic crisis and the Ukrainian pipe supplies kept the production capacities of domestic enterprises underutilized.

Ukraine"s metals industry, a major source of the country"s budget revenues along with the chemicals sector, views Russia as a vast market for the sale of its products at low prices, something potentially damaging for the Russian steel industry.

In 2009, Ukrainian producers exported 230,000 metric tons of pipes to Russia, while Russian manufactures have proposed to limit this volume to 217,000 tons.

MOSCOW, April 8 (RIA Novosti)