BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS
DATE:
21/05/2007
Iran's Ahmadinejad starts state visit to Belarus
Tehran/Minsk - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad arrived in the former Soviet republic Belarus on Monday for a two-day state visit.
President Aleksander Lukashenko, Belarus' authoritarian president, met the Iranian leader at Minsk airport.
The two leaders are scheduled to sign off on a raft of economic agreements, including Belarusian export to Iran of processed metals, agricultural machines, and energy-processing technologies, according to a Belapan news agency report.
A treaty on Iranian export of fish and citrus to Belarus, and changes to both countries' excise taxes with a goal of improving air transport links were also planned, the report said.
During a November visit to Tehran, Lukashenko predicted the present agreements would increase trade between Iran and Belarus to more than 1 billion dollars annually. The volume in 2006 was 38 million dollars.
Belarus during 2007 has attempted to find new foreign trading links, because of a souring of relations with its largest economic partner Russia.
The Kremlin in January 2007 ended most subsidies to energy sold to Belarus.
Since then Lukashenko - whose government is internationally isolated due to its poor human-rights record - has sought alternative allies, among them Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, and Cuba's Fidel Castro.
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