The trade turnover between Russia and Italy in the first two months of 2017 increased by 28 percent. This was stated by Russian President Vladimir Putin at a meeting with Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentioli, the press service of the Kremlin. "Unfortunately, we observed some decline in trade turnover, but as soon as you became prime minister, our trade began to grow: for the first two months of this year - plus 28 percent," Putin said.. On April 11, Putin met with Italian President Sergio Mattarella and expressed regret at the 2.5%. According to Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, mutual trade between the countries fell from 54 to 20 billion dollars. In October 2016, Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi opposed the proposal to impose new sanctions on Russia, for which Germany, France and the United Kingdom voted first. Since the introduction of anti-Russian sanctions, Italy has lost from 3.6 billion to 4 billion euros.

A number of countries, including the United States and the EU states, which includes Italy, have gradually begun to impose sanctions on Russia since March 2014. They explained their decision to the situation in the east of Ukraine and the Crimea's accession to the Russian Federation, and their cancellation was later tied to the implementation of the Minsk agreements. In response, Russia introduced the food embargo in August 2014, which is effective until December 31, 2017, with the possible extension.

Original article: Trade turnover between Russia and Italy grew by 28 percent.