Stanislau Bahdankevich: “Bargain sale of Belarusian banks begins”

External debts of Belarusian banks reached three billion dollar for the first time.

It follows from the figures, which were read out by Pyotr Prakapovich, head of the National Bank of Belarus, during his speech in the “council of the republic.”

According to him, foreign debt increased by more than two billion dollars last year. It has risen by a half of billion during the first quarter of 2008. The main banker of the country said: “We are actively using foreign loans, but it doesn’t threaten the security of our banking system functioning.”

Stanislau Bahdankevich, former head of the National Bank, said in the interview to Radio Svaboda, the Belarusian banking system has been trying to attract as much foreign capital as possible lately.

“One can even say that bargain sale of Belarusian banks begins this year. It was announced that controlling stake in two big state banks (Promstroibank and Investbank) would be sold to foreign capital. Two big banks (Belarusbank and Agrobank) have put up for sale about 15 per cent of their stake. Thus, as many as 7 banks are going to sell considerable part of their assets abroad.

I think such extraordinary actions are explained by a desire to attract investment to the Belarusian economy via banking sector,” Bahdankevich thinks.