Belarus leader refuses to attend Moscow security bloc summit
15:26, 14 June 2009
MINSK. June 14. KAZINFORM Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko will not attend a summit of the post-Soviet security bloc in Moscow on Sunday in protest to Russia's ban on Belarusian dairy product imports, Belarus' Foreign Ministry said, Kazinform refers to RIA Novosti.
Earleir in June, Russia banned imports of over 1,000 types of milk products from Belarus, a major item of its budget revenues, saying producers in the ex-Soviet republic had failed to comply with new Russian standards.
"At this moment, we face an open economic discrimination by one of the members of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) against Belarus in an important category of products," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
"In this situation, Belarus was forced to make a decision on cancelling its participation in the CSTO meeting in Moscow on June 14," the statement said, Kazinform cites RIA Novosti. See www.en.rian.ru for full version.