Belarus should become the free country in 2011 and a member of the European Union in 2016-2017, or it should just come closer to EU membership, having executed all the criteria for this purpose, Andrei Sannikov, the leader of the civil campaign «European Belarus» and the presidential nominee, stated. The politician also said that he didn't see any trade and economic benefits of the Customs Union of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia.
«For example, there is Kazakhstan, and our volume of trade with Kazakhstan must be 1 %. How can we be combined? Besides, Russia and Belarus proclaimed course on WTO membership», Andrei Sannikov said, «Glavkom» informs.
«On the one hand, Russia proposed to join the WTO within the Customs Union. On another hand the Russian Deputy Prime minister Shuvalov said recently that our countries will join the WTO separately. At least for me, WTO is more serious indicator. I think that WTO membership will really provide liberalization of trade and liberalization of relations with other states», the leader of the «European Belarus» said.
The politician mentioned that the relations with Russia are important for Belarus. «It’s very important to clean barriers in relations with Russia, within the Customs Union or not. But our WTO membership is priority. After all in this case the identical rules will be both in Russia, and in Belarus «, Andrei Sannikov considers. In any case, integration into EU and WTO should be strategic priority for Belarus, the presidential nominee added.
Date of the elections in Belarus is not very important, Sannikov
Speaking about the date of presidential election in Belarus, the politician said that it would be better if they were held earlier. «It will be ok if they take place in autumn, because there is a chance that the weather will be good and people will leave on the streets in a good mood to tell this power «No» «, Andrei Sannikov said.
«Date of elections is not important because there are no elections. The opposition won’t get access to the electronic mass-media, controlled by the state, I mean TV and FM-radio stations», the leader of the civil campaign «European Belarus» said.
According to the presidential nominee, it’s unreal that any new channels of information distribution will appear in Belarus. «Therefore date of elections is not important. Simply it’s one more indicator of our regime, when people don’t know when the elections will take place», the politician stated.
