In Tuesday’s interview with the Echo of Moscow radio station, Alyaksandr Lukashenka has admitted that one of Belarus-Russia integration road maps centres around the creation of supranational bodies.
According to him, it is not on the table so far.
“We have the so-called 31st road map, i.e. a plan of establishing supranational bodies, the parliament, there might be also President, etc. But we [Lukashenka and Putin] decided not to talk on this subject. The government made an attempt to fit together the 30 maps which mainly refer to economic issues (customs, economy and so on). These are the plans of the ways we are now moving on. Their basis is economy. Well, protection, diplomacy too… The 31st map is about building a union and supranational bodies. We opted out of discussing this subject back [during the meeting] in Sochi,” he stressed.
However, the Russian side is still trying to get back to it, Lukashenka noted with reference to the recent statement by Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. The latter said that Russia would continue lending support to Belarus only when all integration road maps were implemented. He added that Medvedev was not up to speed on the decision taken in Sochi as he had not participated in the talks in St. Petersburg.
At the same time, during the annual news conference held on December 19, Vladimir Putin said Russia subsidized the economy of Belarus to its own cost; he also stated that Moscow would continue doing so only if the issue of further forming the Union State was settled.
On December 23, Belarusian First Deputy Prime Minister Dzmitry Krutoy stated that the Belarusian-Russian integration package had been almost entirely agreed upon.
