Participation in plenary session of 8th Forum of Regions of Belarus and Russia

Lukashenko addresses plenary session of Forum of Regions of Belarus and Russia

Aleksandr Lukashenko thanked his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin for publicly supporting Belarus in a difficult period, especially amidst the attempts to destabilize the situation in the country and destroy its economy. According to the Belarusian head of state, this matter was also discussed during a telephone conversation between the two leaders earlier on 1 July. “The conclusion we arrived at is the following: we will not just withstand the attacks undertaken against our states. We will use this situation (the way the Russian Federation did when the sanctions were introduced against it) to strengthen economic cooperation and make our states absolutely independent, and not only from the economic point of view. This is the outcome of our negotiations,” the Belarusian head of state said.

The president noted that the Forum of Regions of Belarus and Russia became a key economic and communication project of the Union State.

“Traditional meetings held under the auspices of the upper chambers of parliaments have become the most important economic and communication project of the Union State,” the Belarusian leader said.

He went on saying that Belarus maintains close contacts with more than 70 regions of Russia - from Smolensk to Sakhalin; every year Minsk welcomes a dozen delegations led by Russian governors.

“This and the very work of the forums of regions show that there is no other large-scale integration platform in the Eurasian space where Belarus-Russia cooperation would develop so successfully,” Aleksandr Lukashenko stressed.

According to the president, the main distinguishing feature of such meetings is a meaningful, candid, open and very useful dialogue between friends and partners. “And the results of many years of joint work are quite real and appreciable. Over the past seven years, more than 370 cooperation agreements and contracts have been signed to the amount of nearly $3 billion. Moreover, I would like to emphasize that more than a quarter of this amount is the result of last year’s business meetings,” the head of state said. He is convinced that such a progress is very encouraging.

The ongoing forum is expected to add another $800 million to the total amount of agreements and contracts, the Belarusian leader noted.

Aleksandr Lukashenko thanked his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin for publicly supporting Belarus in a difficult period, especially amidst the attempts to destabilize the situation in the country and destroy its economy. According to the Belarusian head of state, this matter was also discussed during a telephone conversation between the two leaders earlier on 1 July. “The conclusion we arrived at is the following: we will not just withstand the attacks undertaken against our states. We will use this situation (the way the Russian Federation did when the sanctions were introduced against it) to strengthen economic cooperation and make our states absolutely independent, and not only from the economic point of view. This is the outcome of our negotiations,” the Belarusian head of state said.

The construction of the Belarusian nuclear power plant is the most grandiose and most successful Belarusian-Russian project of the last few decades, the head of state said.

Aleksandr Lukashenko said: “With special pride I would like to say that the first unit of the Belarusian nuclear power plant began commercial operation virtually the other day. The second unit will start working in a year. There is no doubt it is the most grandiose and most successful Belarusian-Russian project of the last few decades. It is a vivid testimony that Belarusians and Russians have all the capabilities to continue expanding economic, cultural, and simply friendly ties.”

Aleksandr Lukashenko pointed out that Russia had not simply favorably responded to Belarus’ request for building a nuclear power plant. Vladimir Putin had backed Aleksandr Lukashenko’s request for involving Belarusian specialists in building the nuclear power plant so that they could get precious experience of working on such unique installations. “The president of Russia and I have agreed that if necessary (and it is already necessary) we will be ready to implement such projects beyond the borders of Belarus and Russia together with Russians,” Aleksandr Lukashenko noted.

The head of state noted the rising tensions in the international arena where destructive tendencies have prevailed so far. In particular, the pandemic has become a serious test of strength and the number one problem. "Under these conditions, Russia and Belarus are doing their best to stop it. We see that it is too early to let our guards down. However, I am sure that we will cope with it by our joint efforts," Aleksandr Lukashenko said.о.

He once again thanked the Russian president for his support in the fight against the spread of coronavirus infection. Aleksandr Lukashenko noted that Belarus was the first country that Russia supply the vaccine. Moreover, Belarus has been given the technology of vaccine production. "Once again, Vladimir Vladimirovich, on behalf of the Belarusian people, I publicly thank you not only for delivering the specified volumes of the vaccine on time but also for sharing the production technology with us. We are successfully working, producing more than half a million doses a month," Aleksandr Lukashenko said.

Speaking about the current geopolitical challenges, the Belarusian leader noted the leaders of the Western countries have chosen to rely on force: they openly interfere in the internal affairs of sovereign states, constantly change the rules of the game, ignoring the basic agreements.

"We see the efforts of the Russian leadership to maintain the delicate balance of power on the planet. Unfortunately, the collective West, Washington and Brussels do not always want to hear constructive proposals. Our opponents are slowing down all sensible, positive initiatives and provoking new crises. In fact, the security architecture created after the Second World War, for the victory in which we paid about 30 million lives of Soviet people, is being deliberately destroyed," Aleksandr Lukashenko said.

"First, the former allies have raised a generation who believes that the war was started by Stalin and was won by the United States and England. Now they are rewriting the history and trying to rehabilitate Nazism," he said.

Some post-Soviet countries have already experienced this in full extent. But they failed to implement such a scenario in Belarus, the president said.

"This is why we are being subjected to the undisguised economic and political pressure. They would probably have not needed it now should they won the blitzkrieg they launched last August. But something went wrong for them," Aleksandr Lukashenko said. "It is clear that all the sanctions are simply the unscrupulous attempts to eliminate economic competitors and take hold of human and material resources in our states. The West has set out to hamper development, disrupt integration projects and change the policy of Belarus (and not only our country). Therefore, strengthening the unity and increasing cooperation are of particular importance."

The head of state thanked the Russian president and all Russians for their support to Belarus in its fight to preserve the sovereignty and independence. "This is very important and valuable for us, because we see how the state sovereignty of our southern neighbor is melting away," the Belarusian leader said. “People are suffering from it. We will allow the fraternal ties between peoples to break.”

The president highlighted the importance of digitization which should be aimed at developing enterprises and improving people's living standards.

“This forum is dedicated to cooperation in science and technology in the context of digitization,” the head of state stressed. “Digital technologies became an integral part of our reality long ago. The humanity will face even greater changes in the future. However, these novelties should be aimed at developing enterprises and improving people’s living standards,” he believes.

“It is obvious that countries that do not have the necessary resources will fall behind in the development of digital technologies, which will lead to unbridgeable inequality. We should not let this happen,” the Belarusian president said.

We should not allow one countries dominate others, Aleksandr Lukashenko stressed.

“We also understand that no one will just hand these technologies to us. We should count only on ourselves and on cooperation with our partners. Cooperation in industry and science is the main driver of our integration,” the head of state noted.

“Belarus has something to share with its partners, if they want us to. We are not lagging behind in this field,” the president added.

Time has come to work out a practice-oriented joint digital agenda, he stressed. Aleksandr Lukashenko said he believes that Belarus-Russia interaction in this sphere is lagging behind.

Aleksandr Lukashenko is convinced: “Programs of the Union State of Belarus and Russia should be helpful in this regard. Most of them allow us to create and multiply high-tech materials and manufacturing projects. Moreover, cooperation between Belarusian and Russian scientists in academic science advances.”

The head of state continued: “We expand interaction in space exploration. Together we create high-performance data systems, nanomaterials, work on medical problems and achieve good results in these areas. The Siberian branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences cooperates well with institutions of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus. It once again proves the success of direct contacts with regions.”

“Our key goal is to increase competitiveness of our countries, which is almost impossible at present without breakthrough innovations. Unfortunately, the share of high-technology enterprises in the manufacturing sectors of our economies is not enough and their development is not as robust as it should be,” the head of state noted.

Transition to digital platforms will help increase the innovative potential of Belarus and Russia, Aleksandr Lukashenko believes. “They can become key tools for digital transformation of traditional industries and markets,” he said.

The implementation of priority directions and top-priority tasks concerning the development of the Union State of Belarus and Russia will be finished in 2022. These documents are traditionally approved for a period of four years.

Aleksandr Lukashenko said: “I suggest considering the possibility of preparing a long-term strategy of integration of the Union State of Belarus and Russia, for instance, till 2030. The strategy should be filled with concrete projects taking into account key priorities and vectors of development.”

As a promising sphere of interaction Aleksandr Lukashenko mentioned further development of manufacturing cooperation. The president referred to the production of microchips as an example. In his words, the heads of state had discussed the matter before.

Aleksandr Lukashenko continued: “It is very important for us. Unfortunately, after the Soviet Union collapsed, our enterprises that used to make microchips both in Belarus and Russia fell into ruin a bit. But we’ve agreed that we have a good foundation and we will resuscitate these enterprises. They will operate with the highest standards in the next few years. As President [of Russia Vladimir Putin] said, no high-tech products are possible without these enterprises, including space exploration, defense, and other areas. We are working very seriously on this project together with Russians.”

Aleksandr Lukashenko described the creation and use of artificial intelligence as a promising avenue of cooperation. The president remarked that dozens of companies working in this field develop rapidly in the Hi-Tech Park in Belarus.

In his words, many IT products of theirs could be used in Russia, including in regions. “We have the experience. The Hi-Tech Park successfully competes on the toughest and most demanding markets,” Aleksandr Lukashenko stated.

The Belarusian leader is convinced: “Moreover, today we have no problems with IT professionals possibly thanks to the Hi-Tech Park and possibly because we realized the potential in time and started exploring this field. We have a huge layer of these IT professionals in the production sector and in the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus. They do not simply develop software. They already create end products based on it. As I say, they convert it into hardware and make an end product. Unlike those in the Hi-Tech Park where they make high-quality software and are forced to sell it at half the price to large companies, primarily those in the United States of America. So, we should switch to end products in our Union State, too.”

Yet Aleksandr Lukashenko stated that there are fears in the world that an artificial intelligence can become an instrument of manipulations and the key weapon of hybrid wars.

The president said: “The universal nature of digital technologies, the lack of a geographical anchor and broad accessibility raise the matter of the digital sovereignty of countries and their information independence. As a result, we have another broad field for cooperation where we should step up joint efforts – cyber security.”

Aleksandr Lukashenko went on saying that both Belarus and Russia had directly encountered the destructive consequences of various networking technologies, which are used in the course of constant uncompromised fighting for people’s minds and souls in the Internet. “It is our common threat. We should learn how to effectively counteract it,” he stressed. “Today when a door opens into a new world where artificial intelligence nearly matches the human brain, we have to remember that we shouldn’t lose the key thing – the person and everything human in this person,” he stressed.

Aleksandr Lukashenko mentioned the growing role of mass media in accompanying political, economic, and integration processes.

He said: “We need to strengthen Union State mass media. We have to increase their influence in the common information field, particularly in the Internet. We need people to gain immunity to fake news. We need to ensure a high level of security in the media sphere.”

According to the president, Belarus and Russia should pursue a more substantive youth policy. "We need to make youth policy one of the main priorities of the Union State," Aleksandr Lukashenko said. According to him, this issue will be discussed at the upcoming meeting of the Supreme State Council of the Union State.

The head of state stressed that it is important to raise creative youth - patriots and creative individuals who see their future and the future of their children in their native countries, to create new prospects in the Union State educational space for them.

Aleksandr Lukashenko also noted that the Union State of Belarus and Russia is a treasure that should be preserved, enriched, and passed on to the future generations.

Aleksandr Lukashenko said: “Russia has always been and will be a strategic partner of Belarus. Our brotherly union is a treasure that should be preserved, enriched, and passed on to the future generations.”

He stressed that it is the mission of the current generation and the leadership of Belarus and Russia. Everything necessary for it will be done.