Kiev has suspended a landmark trade deal with the European Union (EU) as its struggling economy failed to get financial aid from its global and European lenders, Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said Friday.

"This decision on this matter was made solely for economic reasons. Ukraine does not change its strategic foreign policy," Azarov told parliament.

At a time when trade between Ukraine and its biggest trade partner, Russia, has slumped over Kiev's plans to forge ties with the EU, the 28-member European bloc has not allocated enough resources to rescue the Eastern European economy, Azarov said.

He added that the International Monetary Fund (IMF)'s "tough" preconditions for granting a new stand-by loan to Ukraine played a decisive role in Kiev's choice.

Azarov explained that Kiev can not fulfill the IMF requirements to raise gas prices for households and reduce welfare payments when people's incomes are at a low level.

Ukraine's export-oriented economy is suffering a 23-percent drop in exports to Russia on the back of this summer's trade dispute, large budget deficit and state debt.

To avoid an economic recession, Ukraine was seeking financial aid from the EU or the IMF to service its foreign debt over the next 18 months.

Failing to obtain a 15.36-billion-U.S.-dollar loan from the global lender and having no hope for any financial aid from the EU, Kiev on Thursday decided to halt its European integration process and renew the dialogue with Russia and other members of the Moscow-led economic group. Endi

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