Republic

MINSK, 19 July (BelTA) – Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko has reaffirmed Belarus’ commitment to deepening cooperation with Russia and the regions. The Belarusian President made this statement as he met with Amur Oblast Governor of the Russian Federation Oleg Kozhemyako on 19 July, BelTA has learnt. “Many say that Lukashenko is overemotional when it comes to relations. We, the Slavs, are always very emotional, we have never built our relations, I mean between Slavonic states, without emotions. In fact, it is a statement of biased mass media,” the President said. Responding to those who say that “Belarus will collapse very soon, it will be divided and eaten by either Nato or the European Union”, Alexander Lukashenko emphasized that nothing of this kind will ever happen, the country will live on. “You should know that you will never be strangers for us, whatever they say or write,” the President said addressing the Amur Oblast Governor. The Belarusian head of state noted that Amur Oblast demonstrates the most vigorous cooperation growth with Belarus among the Russian regions. In his view, this proves that distance is not an obstacle for establishing relations. “The strategy we once came up with to develop relations between Belarus and the regions of the Russian Federation is bearing fruit. We have adopted the same strategy for cooperation with Ukraine. It is a big country, not everything can be settled in Kyiv, we have developed good ties with Ukrainian governors, this is also highly beneficial,” Alexander Lukashenko said. The President emphasized that in recent times a lot has been done to deepen integration of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia and to give a greater freedom to the economy. The Belarusian head of state believes that this yields good results, too. “I am convinced that on 1 January when the single economic space becomes operational, we will revive the single country economically. This is extremely important, too. Of course, there are still many technicalities to be settled, but once Russia has ventured to follow this path, I think these technicalities will be removed soon,” Alexander Lukashenko said. “Therefore we have bright prospects and I want to confirm our commitment to developing cooperation with the Russian Federation, the regions,” he added.

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