Opinion: successful trade with outside world enables Belarus to increase gold and foreign currency reserves

Our country is actively earning foreign currency, accumulating it in its reserves while sanctioners will now receive all payments in Belarusian Roubles – as noted by Aleksei Avdonin, an analyst with the Belarusian Institute for Strategic Studies, in his talk with Belarus 1 TV channel

The expert said that successful trade with the outside world brings foreign currency to Belarus, enabling it to increase its gold and foreign currency reserves, “In August, our international reserve assets rose to almost $8bn. At the same time, the growth was ensured precisely due to an increase in the volume of reserve assets in foreign currency: as of August 1st, 2023 – $3,162.2m, as of September 1st of this year – $3,262.9m.”

Aleksei Avdonin drew attention to the fact that Belarus also fulfils its conditions for external loans, “Our country has adjusted the mechanisms for fulfilling its Eurobond obligations. Now there are three ways to receive payments, including in Belarusian Roubles: exchange for domestic government bonds, redemption at a discount and receipt of payments in Belarusian Roubles. Western politicians wanted to strangle us, they tried through sanctions to deprive us of the opportunity to earn foreign currency from exports, and then declare us bankrupt due to non-payment of external loans in Euros and US Dollars.”

However, nothing worked out for the West, the BISI analyst underlined, “Our country is actively earning foreign currency, accumulating it in its reserves while sanctioners will now receive all payments in Belarusian Roubles and ‘appreciate’ our currency. Western politicians simply have no other choice. When we grow, the initiator of sanctions – the European Union – falls.”