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Lukashenka expected to visit Venezuela next week

Alyaksandr Lukashenka plans to make an official visit to Caracas on March 16 and 17, Russia’s RIA Novosti reported on Friday with reference to Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro.

Mr. Maduro unveiled the news at a meeting that the Belarusian-Venezuelan interstate commission held in the Venezuelan capital city on Thursday, with Belarus’ first deputy prime minister, Uladzimir Syamashka, participating.

The minister did not offer details about the Belarusian leader’s coming visit, noting only that “there are brotherly ties between the two countries,” according to the report.

When reached by BelaPAN, Pavel Lyohki, spokesman for the Belarusian leader, confirmed that Mr. Lukashenka planned to visit the South American country soon but would not disclose any details.

On March 11, online information sources reported that Mr. Lukashenka was staying in Venezuela. An official of the Presidential Administration in Minsk dismissed the information as false.

The report was, perhaps, prompted by a March 6 statement of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez who said, “We are preparing to receive Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka in a couple of days.”

The two leaders last met in Minsk on September 8 and 9, 2009. Mr. Lukashenka paid an official visit to Venezuela in December 2007.

The governments of the two countries plan to set up later this year two joint companies to assemble trucks and tractors using Belarusian technologies.

They have also announced plans to invest $8 billion in oil operations in the Junin 1 block of the Orinoco Belt in the next 25 years.