The Council of Minister’s decree “On some issues of regulation of export of motor fuel from the territory of the Republic of Belarus” introduced five years ago has recently been cancelled.
On September 1, it became possible to travel abroad in a car at least several times a day.
The Resolution #753 according to which it was possible to cross the customs union borders with a full tank without paying any fees more more than once every 8 days was issued by the Council of Ministers on 10 June 2011. If you did it more often, you had to go through the red channel and pay a fee. This way the Belarus authorities tried to deal with the export of fuel abroad, since in Belarus it is cheaper than, for example, in Poland (currently in Belarus US $0.63, Poland – $ 1.08 per liter of AI-95).
Initially, Belarusian border guards ensured the implementation of the decision as follows: a person who drove a car and did not want to pay extra, could go abroad once every eight days. Belarusians quickly solved the puzzle and continued to regularly take the fuel outside the Customs Union: the car was driven by different drivers.
Then the border guards began to count the car movements — a vehicle using the “simplified scheme” could not leave Belarus more than once in eight days.
These limits also hit the Belarusians who did not export fuel. For example, the green card (a compulsory insurance of civil liability of vehicle owners, traveling abroad in their own cars) that costs 50 euros per month, could be used only three times a month. Now the problem has been eliminated by the Council of Ministers’ decree #526 of July 1, 2016.
But it is doubtful that the so-called “diesel carriers” will be able to freely carry fuel in the European Union. As early as 2013, Poland introduced new fuel import rules.
According to them, custom officials note fuel amount in the tank, and cars which often cross the border fall within the special database. If the car with a full tank goes to Poland more than once a week, the owner may be required to pay a fee.
belsat.eu, photo: commons.wikimedia.org
