Specialist in Forestry to Deal with Petrochemical Industry of Belarus

Lukashenka is shifting his failures to the government.

Dissatisfied with the situation in the oil and gas sector of Belarus, Aliaksandr Lukashenka dismissed Deputy Prime Minister Ihar Liashenka, who was in charge of this sphere, "in connection with another job," says Nezavisimaya Gazeta.

By his decree, Lukashenka has appointed Yury Nazarau, a well-known specialist in the field of forestry in Belarus, who's also worked as deputy head of Lukashenka's administration, as the new head of the petrochemical industry of the country. At another meeting on oil imports, Lukashenka once again instructed to find new suppliers and provide logistics for the production of black gold.

Lukashenka reiterated his statement that some countries were accustomed to solving the issues by putting pressure on the partner, but unexpectedly accused the Belarusian leadership. "It's not about grasping at the valve. We are to blame ourselves for non-diversification of oil supplies in due time. Monopolism always leads to such results," said Lukashenka, stressing that "at the moment the country misses about 1 million tons of raw materials every month".

He demanded to present him a plan to reduce the dependence of GDP on oil supplies: "We unreasonably focus on several suppliers, have no long-term alternative sources, while oil becomes cheaper today". Lukashenka made it clear that he was well aware of the problem related to the supply of non-Russian oi. But we can't tread water. According to him, oil transportation issues cannot be solved by contracts alone: "We need complex infrastructure solutions. We need to think over the possibility of joint projects with foreign companies owning crude oil". Lukashenka reminded about alternative routes: the Ukrainian oil pipeline Brody-Odesa and Baltic ports.

According to him, Belarus has close markets, but it needs logistics. "We have worked out a lot on oil supplies in recent months. I have already said that about 40%, maybe 50% will still be bought in Russia (if Russia wants) when we finally diversify. And 30% from the Baltics and Odessa. We will have three sources," BelTA quoted him.

At the same time, Aliaksandr Lukashenka said that the logistics of the Baltic direction should be improved - to establish supplies through pipelines. "It's not a problem to build. By the way, there are already a couple of pipes that would be good for us. If we bring them in order and agree with the Baltic States on these pipes," said Lukashenka, reminding that major assistance in solving oil problems can be expected from the US: "I talked to the Secretary of State on this subject - to help with infrastructure and oil supplies. Pompeo offered oil at competitive prices. At the Munich conference, a statement was made: they allocated us $1 billion to build logistics facilities to get oil. We can expect the cheapest loans from them to build the same unfortunate pipe through the Baltics. Somewhere, we need a couple of jumpers, which the government expects to build for three years. It's not gonna happen! A year and a half or two, no longer! And we'll find $100-120 million for those jumpers. We just need to step up," said Lukashenka. His reasons for his personnel decisions became clear.

The situation in the oil refining industry of Belarus remains complex. At the beginning of the mentioned meeting, Prime Minister Siarhei Rumas once again reported the actual lack of progress. According to him, since the end of last year, the oil refineries of Belarus have been operating being loaded by 50%. "The volume of oil refining in January-February 2020 amounted to 1 million 850 thousand tons of oil. Naftan - 892 thousand tons, Mozyr Refinery - 962 thousand tons. This is less than half of the refinery's capacity," he reported. After that Lukashenka made a speech and finished his speech with a demand to step up.