Russia lifts embargo on Polish plant products: Warsaw

Russia has lifted its embargo on Polish plant products, ending a long-running dispute that was blocking a new EU-Russia agreement, Poland's agriculture ministry said on Saturday.

"An agreement was signed late on Friday by the Russian and Polish agriculture ministers ... at the Berlin agricultural fair," spokeswoman Malgorzata Ksiazek was quoted by news agency PAP as saying.

Last month Russia lifted an embargo on Polish meat that had been imposed in 2005 amid frosty relations between Moscow and the government of right-wing former Polish prime minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski.

New Prime Minister Donald Tusk has made a point of improving Poland's foreign relations, especially with Germany and Russia, since defeating Kaczynski in elections in October.

"It is an important step in relations between the two countries. The success will be complete when Russia and the European Commission reach an agreement on food security. When that happens, the Russian market will be open to all Polish plant products," the spokeswoman said.

Tusk, who is due to visit Moscow on February 8, has let it be known that he is prepared to lift EU member Poland's veto on a new agreement between Russia and the European Union focused largely on energy cooperation.

Poland's new Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski is due to visit Moscow next week.

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