CSTO must react to Tajik situation, Uzbekistan's decision - Lukashenko
MINSK. July 31 (Interfax) - Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has called on the Collective Security Treaty Organization to respond to the ongoing situation in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan's decision to quit the CSTO.
"First of all, I would like you to tell me what you think about Tajikistan. The situation is not easy there, and we must not ignore the address of [Tajik] president," Lukashenko said at a meeting with CSTO Secretary General Nikolai Bordyuzha in Minsk on Tuesday.
The Belarusian president also demanded a response to Uzbekistan's decision to pull out of the CSTO.
"What is all this about? Is it what it [Uzbekistan] wanted earlier [suspend its CSTO membership] or is it something more serious? But we have to make a decision. We have no other choice," he said.
Lukashenko asked Bordyuzha to inform other CSTO member countries of Uzbekistan's decision to quit the organization.
"You have also met with the Russian leaders. You know their position," he said.
"It is a restless time. We need to respond if we are a normal organization. The time has probably come to test our stability," Lukashenko said.
"All of the tendencies we have noted are negative. They mean that tensions are escalating around former Soviet soil and in former Soviet republics themselves. And Tajikistan is just reflecting this tendency toward a negative scenario," Bordyuzha said.
Bordyuzha said he would inform the Belarusian president about the situation within the CSTO, as well as "Uzbekistan's request to terminate its membership in the CSTO."