Bangladesh, Belarus bonhomie for deeper economic cooperation

State Minister for Foreign Affairs Md Shahriar Alam has concluded his Belarus visit and reached Poland as part of Dhaka's efforts to “deepen economic cooperation” with the Eastern European countries.

For Belarus, Bangladesh is a “promising priority” country for sustained economic growth as it has redesigned its foreign policy with more focus on emerging Asian economies.

Bangladesh and Belarus established diplomatic ties in 1992, but neither country has a resident embassy in each other’s capital.

Belarus is a key member of the Eurasian Economic Union of which Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and Armenia are the other members.

Prime Minister Mikhail V Myasnikovich was the first leader who visited Bangladesh in 2012 and announced duty-free quota-free market access for Bangladesh. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina reciprocated the visit next year.

Belarusian company AMKODOR recently delivered road-construction equipment to the Bangladesh Local Government Division under $50 million Export Commodity Credit (soft loans) rendered through Promagroleasing (Belarusian Bank for International Development).

The Bangladesh foreign ministry on Thursday said Alam held bilateral meeting with his Belarusian counterpart Valentin Rybakob, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs in Minsk on Wednesday morning.

Bangladesh,-Belarus

He underscored the closer engagements in the context of exchange of back-to-back Prime Ministerial visits that he said had set the “key directions” of the bilateral relations.

“Both the Ministers agreed that deeper economic cooperation should get main focus, as there is ample scope for further expansion of bilateral trade and investments”.

In that context, Alam sought again support “duty free-quota free” market access of Bangladeshi products to the Eurasian Economic Union.

He invited Belarusian investment to Bangladesh and suggested using the country as a regional hub between China, India and South East Asian Countries.

The state minister who also took a business delegation with him emphasised frequent contacts and interactions between chambers of both countries through regular exchange of trade delegations.

He appreciated Belarus’s concessional loan-based economic cooperation. He also expressed his “satisfaction” as the Joint Venture of Amkodor-Polash Service Center will be inaugurated next week by the Belarusian Minister of Industries at Amkodor-Polash Industrial Zone, Narshingdi.

He hoped that such joint venture would ensure transfer of technology and commence manufacturing of small and light engineering equipment .

The Belarusian Deputy Minister mentioned that “Belarus foreign policy is redesigned with more focus on the emerging economies of Asia and in that context identifies Bangladesh as promising priority country with sustained high economic growth”.

Alam also emphasised on more cooperation on science, technology and innovation to take advantage of talented young population of Bangladesh.

He requested his Belarusian counterpart to provide scholarships with a view to encourage enrollment of more Bangladeshi students in Belarusian universities and technological institutions.

His counterpart emphasised on holding the next round of political consultations between the two foreign ministries at the earliest to discuss all aspects of bilateral relations.

The Belarusian Deputy Minister also requested for arranging first meeting of the Joint Commission on Trade and Economic Cooperation.

The State Minister also visited the Council of the Republic National Assembly (Parliament) during his visit. He also visited the Khatyn Memorial, 54-km away from the capital Minsk, to pay tribute by placing floral wreath in memory of the almost three million Belarusians who died during World War II.

In a meeting with the Bangladesh business delegation, the Belarusian businesses expressed their keen interest on trade, agriculture, agricultural machinery, electro-mechanical and power distribution equipment, road construction equipment and Potash fertilizer.

Alam’s three-day Poland visit started from Thursday.