Belarusian MFA invites European banks to come back

The Ministry of Internal Affairs hopes European banks will take a constructive position on cooperation with the country as trade relations with the EU develop.

“We think European banks will take a more constructive position as trade with the EU demonstrates further growth,” Alyaksandr Huryanau, a deputy foreign minister of Belarus, said commenting on last year's decisions of a number of European banks to halt cooperation with Belarus, Interfax news agency reports.

“There are no cases of imposing new restrictions. There are no new facts of refusal to cooperate with Belarus,” the deputy minister stressed. According to him, “the banks with a pragmatic position pursuing commercial interests” come to a free place.

As charter97.org has already informed,  Deutsche Bank, BNP Paribas and the Royal Bank of Scotland announced in late 2011 they stopped cooperation with the Belarusian authorities for political reasons. These banks and Russia's Sberbank organized two issues of $1.8 billion in Belarusian government bonds in 2010 and early 2011.

The deputy minister also voiced out the plans of creating Soyuzkali corporation on the base of the Belarusian Potash Company. He neither confirmed nor denied the information that Belarusian Potash Company headquarters would be moved to Switzerland.

“We suppose  Minsk will have the significant coordinating functions,” he said.

Huryanau noted the issue of  company's headquarters location was under consideration.