OREANDA-NEWSRussia will provide Belarus with a loan of $ 600 million. To repay part of the previous Russian loans. Minsk will receive another $ 200 million from the Eurasian Fund. Belarusian head Alexander Lukashenko intends to deepen integration with the Russian Federation. Belarus still doesn't have other full-fledged partners and creditors.

On the allocation of a new loan of $ 600 million, said First Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Finance Anton Siluanov. He clarified that these credit funds will go to refinance payments to repay the principal debt on loans previously provided by Russia. “Russia will provide Belarus with a state financial loan in the amount of up to 600 million US dollars,” said Siluanov.

The head of the Ministry of Finance also said that Minsk had completed the fulfillment of the commitments required to provide the next, seventh tranche of the loan of the Eurasian Fund for Stabilization and Development. 

To refinance foreign debt, payments on which in 2019 will amount to $ 3.6 billion, the Belarusian government has asked for a state loan of $ 1 billion. This sum was discussed in September at the talks between Lukashenko and Putin in Sochi, and there were no objections, as the president of Belarus assured later. As a result, in October, Anton Siluanov summarized that the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation would consider giving Belarus a loan of $ 630 million to refinance its debt to Russia.

Earlier, the Prime Minister of Belarus Sergei Rumas complained that Moscow is offering to refinance only payments attributable to Russia itself. At the same time, the Belarusian authorities recognized that even Moscow stopped issuing loans for refinancing just like that. It was also reported that Moscow allocated a $ 10 billion loan to Minsk for the construction of the NPP. The credit line for the construction of the Belarusian NPP is open until 2035.