Belarusian president says Moscow, Beijing always helped his country

Russia and China have always helped and supported Belarus, and Minsk will reciprocate, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has stated.

Speaking during a meeting with Alexei Russkikh, governor of Russia’s Ulyanovsk Region, the president voiced his dissatisfaction with some Western countries, Caliber.Az reports, citing Belarusian media.

He noted that they did not want to maintain friendly, neighbourly relations.

“And with neighbours, you should always try to maintain good relations. That is what we are doing. Well, the West does not want such relations with us. Well, God be with them, that is their business. But Russia, whoever we talk to, we have also spoken about this with the Americans recently, this is always taken out of the equation by the state together with the People’s Republic of China,” the president stressed. “We are located in the centre of Europe. As I often say, neighbours. And you will agree with me: they are given by God, they are not chosen.”

According to him, Moscow and Beijing have always extended a helping hand to Belarus.

“These are people (the authorities of Russia and China – ed.) who have always extended a hand to us, helped us and supported us. We will do the same in return for our Russian brothers, the citizens of the Republic of China and others in the East,” the Belarusian leader emphasised.

Lukashenko maintained that Western sanctions pressure had opened up the East to Minsk and Moscow.

“Sanctions were imposed on us (Belarus – Sputnik) and Russia, and the East is open to us. We are not a giant economy to suffer from geopolitical ambitions. As I often say, we do not need much for our people to live normally and for the economy to function,” he added.

He further stated that technology was the main priority for Belarus.

“For us, the main thing is technology. We need to deepen this, we have not lost anything from the Soviet era, we have not closed or shut anything down; on the contrary, we have developed it,” the head of state remarked.

In his words, it is important for any state to preserve what previous generations created, as well as what exists today.

“This is important for any state, and China is a very telling example for us in this regard. We are friends with Xi Jinping, and we often discuss this topic with him. He often tells me that we (China – ed.) did not reject anything. Neither the period of Mao Zedong nor Deng Xiaoping, nor anyone else,” Lukashenko said.

By Bakhtiyar Abbasov