Lukashenka instructs PM to establish contacts with Poland

During a visit to the national airport in Minsk, Aliaksandr Lukashenka suddenly spoke about the need for good relations with Western countries.

Belarus currently cooperates mainly with Russia and China, he said. "But we should not forget about the high-tech West. They are close, they are our neighbors - the European Union. And we can not lose relations with them. We are ready for it, but we need to take into account our own interests," said Lukashenka.

According to Lukashenka, already in July he instructed the government and the Foreign Ministry to propose a plan of good-neighborliness and peace to the Western neighbors.

He also said he had instructed Prime Minister Raman Halouchanka to contact Poland: "If they want, let's talk, let's establish relations. We are neighbors, and neighbors are not chosen, they come from God".

He later said that Poland was unlikely to make any concessions on the eve of the parliamentary elections scheduled for October 15: "They demand a lot from us and ask for a lot, but we can't go for it, because it's against our interests".

Meanwhile, official Warsaw has repeatedly said that any warming of relations between the countries is possible only after the release of at least one political prisoner, Andrzej Poczobut, a journalist and activist of the Polish minority. In response to Poczobut's sentence (8 years in prison), Poland closed almost all checkpoints (except for the Terespol-Brest crossing for cars and the Kazlovičy-Kukuryki post for trucks).