"Today Russia began to apply the escort requirement from the border to internal customs offices in various locations. To our knowledge, 40 trucks have already been escorted. One such escort, for example, to Moscow costs 900 litas (EUR 261)," Gytis Vincevičius, the spokesman, told BNS.
Vincevičius said that it was not clear at the moment on what basis Russia had imposed the new requirement. "We are becoming uncompetitive not only in terms of (delivery) time, but also in terms of transportation prices," he said.
The spokesman said that Lithuanian haulers' losses over the past week were at least 10 million euros.
In early September, Russia tightened checks on passenger cars from Lithuania, and on September 12, on trucks. Haulers said last Wednesday that only trucks carrying perishable goods were spared extra detailed checks.
According to Linava, around 650 Lithuanian-registered transport companies with some 13,000 trucks ship goods to Russia.
