“Russia is all on fire” - Lukashenko
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has gone into hysterics over Russia's closure of their common border due to the coronavirus, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
The reason is clear - Belarus will experience serious shocks from the severance of ties with its main trading partner.
“The biggest thing for us (not a problem, but a responsibility) is the economy. Unfortunately, all these movements in the direction of coronavirus have had a very dramatic impact on the economy. It got to the point that our native Russia – I emphasize – closed the border with Belarus,” Lukashenko is quoted as saying by his official website.
He is clearly offended that preliminary negotiations on closing the border were conducted at the level of prime ministers (Mikhail Mishustin and Sergei Rumas called twice over the weekend), but President Putin did not call Lukashenko.
“How can you make such decisions? Without consulting, present a fait accompli. This is not clear to me. And the most interesting thing: if we are to close the border, it’s probably not the government’s business. This decision must be made by the president of the country,” Lukashenko said.
“Batka” claims that the coronavirus is not such a serious problem: “We survived these viruses, we will survive this one.”
In his opinion, there is little danger only for large cities.
Then he issued two mutually exclusive statements in a row: he called on Belarusians not to buy gauze bandages, which, it turns out, the local industry has sewn so much that there is nowhere to put them.
But in Russia, according to Lukashenko, there is an epidemic.
“The situation in Belarus is relatively calm, but Russia is all on fire from the coronavirus. So who should close themselves off from whom? The question is rhetorical,” Lukashenko said.
36 cases of coronavirus have currently been identified in Belarus. That is, the incidence rate is already 1 case per 250 thousand population. This is 9 times higher than in Russia, where the incidence rate is 1 case per 2 people.
English version :: Read in English: "Russia is ablaze" – Lukashenko