Russia's top food health inspector on Thursday accused the European Union of failing to live up to its end of a deal aimed at ending a Kremlin ban on EU vegetable imports, according to dpa. "There is an absolutely logical question that needs to be asked: How do vegetable producers in Europe feel about the fact that, because EU officials are not doing their job, European produce can't be sold in the Russian market?" said Russian chief doctor Gennady Onishchenko. European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said Friday that Russia had agreed to lift the ban once a certification process was implemented guaranteeing the safety of EU vegetables. Russia imposed the ban in early June after an outbreak of E coli in Germany. EU officials have since stressed that the suspected source of the affected vegetables did not export any produce beyond Germany, thus making the Russian ban pointless. Onishchenko said that the EU has yet to explain how a bacterium usually associated with animal waste found its way onto German produce, the Interfax news agency reported. Charges by EU officials that the continued ban is Russia's fault amount to an effort to avoid responsibility, he added. "They have refused to put into effect specific suggestions that both sides agreed to in talks (at last week's EU-Russia summit)," he said. "Now they are making unvarnished attempts to dictate their will to Russia." The EU has failed to provide Russia an example of new health safety certificates that would affirm the safety of EU vegetables, he said. Russia will lift its ban when the EU identifies the means by which the E coli was transmitted to the German vegetables, finds the bacterium's ultimate source, and demonstrates the infection is not spreading any more, he said.
