Belarus completes all procedures to sign CSTO CRRF agreement
MINSK, 2 October (BelTA) – Belarus has completed all procedures necessary for signing the Collective Rapid Response Force Agreement of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko told a press conference for Russian regional mass media.
“We have completed all procedures relating to the signing of the document,” the President of Belarus said. He also reminded that Belarus is ready to preside in the CSTO next year as well. “Belarus will make up for everything it owes to this organization,” Alexander Lukashenko said.
The President stressed that Belarus does not refuse from cooperation within the framework of the CSTO. “We have always supported integration processes, and the CSTO is a close-knit organization promoting cooperation in military area, military and technical interaction. We are very interested in this,” the head of state said.
According to Alexander Lukashenko, cooperation within the CSTO should not be linked to milk disputes. He believes that this economic dispute was “entirely subjective”. “A hundred and fifty refrigerators with perishable products going to Russia were stopped at the border on a technicality for no good reason, just to teach us a lesson. Those were thousands of items of dairy products,” the President said.
“This move was meant against our state. What did I have to do? I do not have the same leverage as Russia has against Belarus. This is why I had to refuse from going to Moscow in an emphatic manner. But it has nothing to do with the CSTO,” the Belarusian leader underlined. “Later they linked these two events and said that Lukashenko veered to the West and is destroying the CSTO,” the head of state added.
