Belarus decides against adjusting time in Russia's wake

Belarus will not switch to winter time after Russia does so.

According to the press secretary, a dedicated government commission has weighed all pros and cons. The deliberation resulted in the decision to leave time in Belarus as it is.

Earlier Chairman of the State Standardization Committee of Belarus Viktor Nazarenko was quoted as saying that the reasons in favor of Belarus making the transition to winter time were insufficient.

An interagency commission is in charge of working out recommendations concerning time measurements in Belarus. The commission comprises representatives of the Healthcare Ministry, the Transport and Communications Ministry, the Energy Ministry, the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus and other concerned government agencies and institutions.

Belarus stopped switching back and forth between summer time and winter time in 2011 for the sake of enabling unified time measurement in the Customs Union of Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Russia and for the sake of fully using the light time of the day, improving work and rest conditions for the population. Russia did the same in 2011. However, on 1 July 2014 the State Duma of the Russian Federation decided that the country has to go back to winter time as from 26 October 2014. As many as 11 time zones will be set up in Russia. The Moscow time will be used as the reference time to calculate the local time in these zones.