Russia ready to "refinance" Belarusian debt via intergovernmental loans, EurAsEC
ST. PETERSBURG. April 4 (Interfax) - Russia is ready to refinance Belarusian debt, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said after a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
"I am grateful to you for meeting us halfway in terms of the refinancing of those debts to Russia this year," Lukashenko told Putin.
"The [Russian] president promised that today or tomorrow he will give relevant instructions on the matter," the Belarusian leader said, without specifying what debt and what refinancing was being spoken about.
Since the beginning of 2016, Belarusian consumers have been underpaying for the Russian gas to Gazprom Transgaz Belarus (having run up a debt of about $550 million over the year), citing the possibility of having the price calculated based on gas prices in Europe, which had fallen sharply by then, rather than under the contract formula.
Russian Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich told Interfax that the refinancing announced by Lukashenko is not linked to the resolution of the gas issue. "This is about intergovernmental loans and debts via the Eurasian Economic Community (EurAsEC) Fund," he said.
The EurAsEC Anti-crisis Fund approved the first loan to Belarus in 2011, a 10-year $3 billion stabilization loan under a floating rate with a three year grace period, to support its balance of payments. The EurAsEC Anti-crisis Fund was transformed into the Eurasian Fund for Stabilization and Development (EFSD) in 2015. In March 2016 the EFSD approved providing
Belarus with a $2 billion 10-year loan with a five year grace period to support economic policy measures and structural reform.