MINSK, 23 October (BelTA) – In an interview with the Kazakh national television news agency Khabar Belarus President Aleksandr Lukashenko specified conditions that will make oil import and processing from Kazakhstan to Belarus possible, BelTA has learned.
Aleksandr Lukashenko said: “I think we will be able to import and process oil if we agree on the price. Why shouldn't we agree? Together we will be able to process your oil and sell [the resulting products] on the premium European market, on the Ukrainian market, on any market because we make quality oil products. I haven't tried to hide the fact that we are going to discuss it during my visit to Kazakhstan.”
Aleksandr Lukashenko said he was confident it is necessary to develop bilateral contacts between Eurasian Economic Union member states. “We need joint projects. Not only Kazakh-Russian ones or Belarusian-Russian ones but direct ones, too – Kazakh-Belarusian ones,” the president explained. However, one has to deal with various barriers while trying to advance such contacts. “We sometimes create these barriers for ourselves. We have not fully unified national laws. We don't adapt the decisions that we sometimes pass to the national legislations. We don't adjust the national laws. These are issues of essentially subjective nature. They need to be fixed. Barriers must be dismantled,” the head of state stressed.
“Let me repeat it: if there are barriers inside our union, Kazakhstan may start looking for options. If oil cannot be delivered to an ally – Belarus – because Russia doesn't allow it, then Kazakhstan may start looking in the direction of China or to the south in the direction of Pakistan and India. Is it normal? It is not,” the Belarusian leader continued.
“I think if Russia is interested in the development of our economic union, it will not interfere with our plans,” Aleksandr Lukashenko added. “Because if we start blocking common projects in the Eurasian Economic Union, well then, I often say it, then other countries like Belarus and Kazakhstan will start looking for happiness in other places.”
