MINSK, 5 December (BelTA) – Belarus advocates new projects in the Central European Initiative (CEI) region and the prevention of dividing lines. The matter was raised at the annual Summit of the Heads of Government of the Central European Initiative, BelTA learned from the press service of the Belarusian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
At the plenary session, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Oleg Kravchenko outlined Belarus' priorities in cooperation with the CEI and approaches to strengthen it. The head of the Belarusian delegation emphasized the permanent demand for CEI at the current stage, the need to build up applied project activities in socially and economically significant areas and to prevent the emergence of dividing lines in the region.
The Belarusian delegation took part in the approval of updated guidelines and rules of the CEI procedure, an interim report on the implementation of the CEI action plan for 2018-2020 and the ceremony of handing over the CEI presidency from Croatia to Italy.
Oleg Kravchenko spoke at the working meeting of the heads of delegations with Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic and held talks with Assistant Minister of Foreign and European Affairs of Croatia Vice Skracic on the prospects of the Belarusian-Croatian relations.
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The head of the Belarusian delegation met with newly appointed Secretary General of the organization Roberto Antonione to discuss cooperation possibilities and had a brief conversation with European Commissioner for European Neighborhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations Johannes Hahn about the next steps in relations with the EU. The Belarusian deputy minister of foreign affairs also met with the heads of the delegations of a number of other CEI member states.
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CEI is an intergovernmental association established in 1989 to develop regional cooperation. Currently, CEI includes 17 states: Albania, Belarus, Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Hungary, Italy, Macedonia, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Ukraine, Croatia, Montenegro and the Czech Republic. Belarus joined the initiative in 1996.
Photo courtesy of Belarus' Ministry of Foreign Affairs
