At the end of May, one needs a timeline to confirm the weather integrity — it was unusually hot by us. However, no excessiveness feels common. It is a comparison that is important to us in this case. It was hot by us, but in Europe it was cool with showers, and some places like Australia, for example, had huge snow downfall.Indeed, everybody, from neighbors to TV-hosts, were saying something like, look, what is going on in Europe. Hold on! But we are Europe as well. Yep, Europe we are. At least geographically speaking. There is a vast European outpost to the east of us up to Ural Mountains. It is still unusual, though. Yes, we are Europeans, but we are not used to this. I think that it is high time to start getting used. A stronger feeling of European identity is nothing more but an emotional penetration in deeper cultural formations, an understanding that we a country with old European traditions, with our rich history and valuable heritage. What about the weather? It can differ even within a city. Even in a small village it happens that one side is enjoying sunlight while it is pouring down with rain on the other. What can be said about weather variety as far as hundreds or even thousands kilometers are concerned.
Distances do not matter if countries want to trade, intensify scientific and other productive types of cooperation. In this issue we will pay attention to certain correspondence. It is about Belarus and France and our intentions to deepen the reciprocity of our business and industrial structures. This position was announced by the Prime-Minister of the Republic of Belarus and the Ambassador of France in Belarus. The grounds for this have been ready long ago. The goods turnover with other EU-countries is still bigger than with France. Although the bilateral trade dynamics is actually not so bad, the trade volume experienced a three times increase in the last four years. By the way, after the aforementioned meeting, the news agencies highlighted a very characteristic statement, made by the Belarusian prime-minister, who emphasized that the business circles of Belarus and France are up to more active work than the governments of the two countries. This statement with no doubt contains hidden reserves for cooperation. It is important that the ambassador of France in Belarus Ms. Mireille Musso expressed confidence that the economic relations of our two countries must and will develop. This confidence is based on real intentions, seems like. We consider reasonable the ambassador’s wish for both of our countries to know each other better not only in economic terms but in other spheres as well, because Belarus, since some time already, has become a neighbor to the European Union.
Indeed, us being neighbors to Poland in the West means being neighbors to the whole European Union. It makes conclusion even more obvious — we need to strengthen our positions here. By the way, Mr. Pavel Latushko, the ambassador of the Republic of Belarus in Poland will give an account of the achievements in this direction in this issue. It is obvious that Belarus is tied to Poland not only by a common border-line, but by tight economic ties as well. And what we have here is more than a two billion goods turnover, according to statistics, — a good weather forecast for a fruitful business.
Viktor Kharkov
Editor of “Беларусь.Belarus”
