MINSK, 13 April (BelTA) – Over $800 million was spent on repaying and servicing Belarus' foreign state debt in Q1 2021, BelTA learned from Belarusian Finance Minister Yuri Seliverstov on 13 April.
The official said: “As for such a significant article of expenditure as forex payments on the state debt, we gave away $881.8 million to honor our commitments, repay and service the foreign state debt. We are working on a loan from the Eurasian Fund for Stabilization and Development and on a government loan from the Russian Federation in accordance with previous arrangements with Russia.”
In his words, work is in progress on returning to the borrowing market. “It is a complicated process during a pandemic because everyone needs additional resources in these conditions. We are primarily intent on returning to the Russian market. We are also working on access to the Asian market. We tapped into the European market literally last year and have no intention of doing it every year,” the finance minister noted.
“Since a considerable part of our commitments is in Russian rubles, we are interested in the Russian market where we can borrow funds and spend them on repaying and servicing our commitments to the Russian Federation. The colleagues are ready to work with us,” Yuri Seliverstov added.
