OREANDA-NEWS. March 15, 2011. The Head of FAS Russia Igor Artemiev had a bilateral meeting with Joaquin Almunia, Vice-President of the European Commission, Competition Commissioner, reported the press-centre of FAS Russia.

The top-level meeting is an important even in the history of cooperation between FAS Russia and the Directorate General for Competition of the European Commission. For the first time in the history of relations between the two agencies, FAS and Directorate General on Competition of the European Commission signed the Memorandum of Understanding.

Prior to signing the Memorandum, the two agencies were engaged in active working cooperation on various issues. The Memorandum provides for specific mechanisms of interaction between the parties engaged in enforcement actions, which will enable to reach a new level of cooperation in competition enforcement.

As stated by Igor Artemiev: “In the context of globalization timely cooperation of the authorities from various countries in the world is playing a more important role, and the Memorandum enables cooperation and coordination of law enforcement actions, which is a step towards future joint investigations of antimonopoly violations and control over transnational mergers with due regard for confidentiality”.

The parties also discussed importance of a new basic agreement between Russia and the EU, which is being drafted, and underlined that in order to form a harmonized legal field it is absolutely essential to reflect common positions on competition in the new basic agreement.