Speaking at a meeting on the prospects for the Horizont Holding, including the Brest Electric Lamp Plant, development today, President Aleksandr Lukashenko stated that the chosen path of Belarus’ development – based on the experience and achievements of the Soviet period – is correct, BelTA reports
Aleksandr Lukashenko recalled that he had been criticised and called a communist in the post-Soviet space for refusing to fully switch to the market economy as it is presented in the West. “The market, competition, and so on… Let’s make everyone plunge into this market, they will crawl out,” the President cited the statements spread back then. “We were also being pushed to plunge into this market, as they realised that we would not manage to withstand the competition against them [Western countries] – and everything here would become theirs.”
Such a path was unacceptable for Belarus. “We are not Americans who imposed the market [economy] on us. We, unlike them, are not printing money, Dollars, which will be needed all over the world tomorrow. You know their advantages: they have accumulated a certain effect in the war and elsewhere,” the Head of State noted.
“Thanks to Donald Trump. He is a more open politician, excessively open. We now understand what kind of policy [the United States has in relation to other countries]. Do you understand now what they wanted from us? Oil, money… If there is no oil, they bomb. He openly says that he has no need in Venezuela: oil is needed. I understood that a long time ago. I could not voice that publicly,” the President said.
Aleksandr Lukashenko named China as an example of a wise and prudent model of state development. Unlike the countries of the post-Soviet space, the Communist Party and the country’s governance system have not been destroyed, but developed there. The Head of State emphasised the role of Chinese President Xi Jinping in this process, as he combined the experience of the past with the present and produced results. “Chinese have acted wisely. We need to study this experience, it gives results,” he said.
Belarus has also chosen the correct path by not abandoning the Soviet past. “Time has passed, and we see that we were right. Thanks to the President of Russia, who already publicly says: ‘Well done, Belarusians. They have not destroyed anything, they have preserved it, unlike us Russians, a rich country’. I really appreciate it, it’s a good assessment for me,” the Belarusian leader said.