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Union programs with Russia do not lead to loss of Belarusian sovereignty, Lukashenko says

The President noted that states do not need to include other states to build close relations
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko Pavel Orlovsky/BELTA/TASS
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko
© Pavel Orlovsky/BELTA/TASS

MINSK, September 1. /TASS/. Union programs on integration with Russia do not lead to a loss of sovereignty, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko told journalists on Wednesday.

"There is no question of a loss of sovereignty. Today, we are educated and smart enough to build the kind of relations that neither federative nor unitary states have, without losing either Russian or Belarusian sovereignty," Lukashenko said, according to BelTA.

The President noted that states do not need to include other states to build close relations.

"Nobody needs to be included. We must build relations as two sovereign states," he said.

In particular, Lukashenko provided the union military-technical cooperation program as an example.

"[We are] two sovereign states, yet we have built our relations. We have effectively a single army, with the Belarusian army at its core in the Western direction. If a war happens, god forbid, the Belarusian Army joins the fight first, and then the entire Western part of the Russian Armed Forces joins in, and we build defense and resistance to the enemy together," the Belarusian leader noted, adding that "there is no need today to destroy sovereignty and independence of states."