Opinions & Interviews

SOCHI, 1 December (BelTA) - Belarus would like to take an active part in joint projects with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, Belarus Prime Minister Andrei Kobyakov said at a SCO Council of Heads of Government meeting in Russia's Sochi, BelTA has learned.

The Shanghai Cooperation Organization, with India and Pakistan as new members, has strengthened the status of one of the most influential associations. Belarus is an observer of the SCO.

“Today Belarus has the necessary industrial, scientific, technological and innovative capacities to make a worthy contribution to joint projects in industry, information and communications technology, energy, agriculture and other industries. We reaffirm our willingness to be a meaningful responsible participant in joint projects. We are in favor of greater involvement of the observer countries in project activities of the organization,” Andrei Kobyakov said. Increased interaction between the SCO Business Council and the Chambers of Commerce of observer countries and dialogue partners will also contribute to this. The Belarusian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the business community are ready to get involved in the work of the SCO Business Council in the implementation of specific projects.

Andrei Kobyakov noted that a new global architecture of security and sustainable economic development is emerging in the world. “Without diminishing the importance of the existing universal institutions, it is evident that we need to search for additional factors to ensure regional and global political and economic stability and security. In this context, the SCO member countries, observers and dialogue partners seem to have literally a historic opportunity to act as one of the leaders of the process,” the prime minister said.

Fully sharing the objectives of the SCO in confronting the threats of terrorism, extremism, organized crime and drug trafficking, Belarus believes that one of the key factors that reinforce these threats is economic and social instability. In this connection, Belarus is in favor of strengthening the economic dimension of the SCO.

The SCO member countries have already put forward a number of global initiatives aimed at forming a new mutually beneficial platform for combining economic capacities of the states in the region. These include China’s Belt and Road initiative and Russia's approaches to the formation of a large Eurasian partnership. Fully sharing and supporting these approaches, Belarus has also suggested the “integration of integrations” idea aimed at creating additional opportunities for liberalizing trade in the Eurasian continent both in the west and also in the east. Implementing specific multilateral projects between the EAEU and SCO participating countries will yield a synergy effect.

“Singing an agreement on trade and economic cooperation between the EAEU member states and China will make the basis of interaction between these integration associations. We believe that the start of the negotiations between the EAEU member states and India on the free trade agreement may be an additional factor which may increase the potential of aligning the EAEU and the SCO. We welcome the increased contacts between the EAEU member states and Pakistan,” the prime minister noted.