An International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission will be working in Belarus on June 5-12, state-run news agency BelTA reports.
The mission led by Peter Dohlman will assess the country’s economic policy and hold annual consultations with the Belarusian authorities over Article IV (obligations in respect of exchange regulations) in the run-up of the IMF annual mission which is expected to visit Belarus in October.
This year, Belarus announced its intention to start a new program on cooperation and borrow $3.5 bn from the IMF.
‘No loan for dictator’
In late May, Belarusian Dzyanis Kazakevich handed over a petition signed by morethan 3,000 persons to the International Monetary Fund to Jeffrey Franks, Director of IMF Europe office in Brussels. The petitioners asked the Fund not to grant loans to president Alyaksandr Lukashenka
Dzyanis Kazakevich in Belsat TV show
According to Kazakevich, it is economically and politically unreasonable to provide $3.5 bn loan taking into account that that the large-scale Belarus-Russia joint military exercise West 2017 will be held here soon. In his opinion, lending money to the dictator who ‘cynically violates human rights’ is wrong.
