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Lukashenko says Belarus may leave EEU if others default on agreements

Belarus will be promoting deeper integration within the EEU by all possible means and working for the creation of an equitable union, President Alexander Lukashenko said
Supreme Eurasian Economic Council meeting  EPA/MAXIM SHIPENKOV
Supreme Eurasian Economic Council meeting
© EPA/MAXIM SHIPENKOV

MINSK, January 29. /TASS/. Belarus will reserve the right to leave the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) if the agreements achieved within the union’s framework are not observed, President Alexander Lukashenko told a news conference for domestic and foreign mass media on Thursday

He warned that further efforts to build the Eurasian Economic Union would not be easy.

Belarus will be promoting deeper integration within the EEU by all possible means and working for the creation of an equitable union without exemptions or omissions, he promised. "We are obliged to use the opportunities opening up within the framework of the Eurasian Economic Union," he said, adding that Belarus took the office of the EEU chairman on January 1, 2015.

Belarusian trade with Russia and West

Belarus trade with Western countries is bigger that trade with Russia, Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko told a press conference in Minsk on Thursday.

"We have been already trading more with the West than with Russia," Lukashenko said.

According to Lukashenko, Russia accounts for 42% in trade turnover with Belarus, compared with the previous figure of 85%. Lukashenko said Minsk’s main goal is to diversify exports.