KIEV, Dec. 29 - Imperial Tobacco in Ukraine says that retaining of the ad valorem rate of the excise duty on cigarettes with the increase of the specific rate by 40%, to UAH 318.26 per 1,000 cigarettes is anticompetitive.

"Compared to the initially proposed figures by the Finance Ministry [40% for the specific rate, 15% for ad valorem rate] the adopted bill deprives the national budget of an additional UAH 1.5 billion. This is the cost of the refusal of lawmakers to increase the ad valorem rate by 3 percentage points," Corporate Affairs Director at Imperial Tobacco in Ukraine, Moldova and the Caucasus countries Oleh Strekal told Interfax-Ukraine.