MOSCOW, June 19 (Xinhua) -- Russia will soon impose duties on imports of U.S. goods in response to U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum, Russian Economic Development Minister Maxim Oreshkin said Tuesday.
It will take several days to compile the list of the U.S. goods and the duties will not affect Russia's macroeconomic indicators, Oreshkin was quoted by TASS news agency as saying.
With a few suspensions and exemptions, the United States introduced a 25-percent tariff on steel and a 10-percent tariff on aluminum imports starting March 23 to protect its domestic producers.
According to official Russian customs data, last year the country exported 8.9 million tons of rolled steel products worth 3.3 billion U.S. dollars and 3.5 million tons of aluminum worth nearly 5 billion U.S. dollars.
In April, Russian Deputy Industry and Trade Minister Viktor Yevtukhov said that Moscow saw the U.S. introduction of tariffs as an extreme measure.
According to Yevtukhov's preliminary assessment, Russia will lose 2 billion U.S. dollars for steel and 1 billion U.S. dollars for aluminum.
