BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

27/06/2007

Venezuelan president to visit Minsk

MINSK. June 27 (Interfax) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is to arrive in Minsk on a working visit on June 29, the Venezuelan embassy in Belarus has informed Interfax.

"It will be a one-day working visit. The Venezuelan president is expected to give a press conference," the embassy said.

Chavez paid an official visited to Belarus on July 23-25 2006, striking a deal to set up joint ventures and assembly lines, and to buy MAZ trucks and MTZ tractors.

In addition, oil-bearing zones were allotted to Belarus where oil is to be extracted and refined jointly. Belarus is expected to extract 10 million tones of oil in Venezuela each year.

Belarus and Venezuela signed military-technical cooperation contracts worth over $1 billion, according to Viktor Sheiman, the Belarusian Security Council's state secretary. Sheiman was leader of an official Belarusian delegation which visited Venezuela on September 7 and 8 2006.

Source:

http://www.interfax.com/3/287262/news.aspx