Russia has been a WTO member for now more
than two years, the date of accession being 22 August 2012. Russia has
become an active user of the WTO dispute settlement mechanism first as a
third party. Less than a year after Russia’s accession, unlike in many other cases of newly acceded WTO members, Russian measures got challenged at the WTO by some other WTO members.
As
of now, Russia is a respondent in 6 disputes, two of which were brought
by different WTO members regarding the same matter – Japan and the EU –
in respect of Russia’s vehicle recycling fees, but since the Russian legislation in question has in the meantime been amended, the complainants seem no longer to
pursue this claim. Other disputes concern Russia’s SPS measures imposed
on live pigs and pork, antidumping measures imposed on light commercial
vehicles and bound tariffs (in all these cases the complaining party is
the EU).
Russia
has also initiated two disputes, both against the EU, challenging its
energy cost adjustment methodologies used in antidumping investigations
and the EU’s Third Energy Package.
Statistics show that Russia participates in WTO disputes by far more frequently than other WTO member countries of the Region of Caucasus/Central Asia (Armenia, Georgia, Kyrgyz Republic, and Tajikistan).