Lukashenko: Belarus will build its own port near St. Petersburg
The President of Belarus, Aleksandr Lukashenko, told journalists about this today after his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow, BelTA reports
“I am grateful to Vladimir Putin for giving orders directly, as I asked. We need a port. In violation of international agreements, the roads, routes, and ports where we worked were closed for us. This is unacceptable: if a state does not have access to the sea, the states that have such access have no right to close. This is a violation. The President of Russia gave an order (I asked him to help us with this, to ensure there’s no red tape, no bureaucracy; it’s not about money, we have enough money for this), so that we can build our own port near St. Petersburg and tranship millions of tonnes of cargo there,” noted Aleksandr Lukashenko. “Orders were given in my presence to start this construction immediately.”
“We will start transhipping these millions of tonnes of cargo within a year or a year and a half (I don’t know exactly as the ambassador was dealing with this issue). But if we leave Ukraine, Lithuania, which earned 30 percent of their budget revenues due to our transit, we won’t return there. Therefore, we will withstand,” stressed the Head of State.
The President is convinced that the West will continue its attempts to put pressure on Belarus and Russia in every possible way, looking for a pretext for unleashing an economic war. “Whatever the situation, sanctions are also a moment of opportunity. Most important is import substitution. We will overcome these difficulties, even in terms of the most advanced technologies. We can do everything,” noted Aleksandr Lukashenko.