Events

Yelena Kupchina said that two rounds of consultations between experts of Belarus and the European Union were held in June and November 2014 for the sake of signing the two agreements — the agreement on facilitating visa procedures and the agreement on readmission — that make up a package of documents.

According to Yelena Kupchina, back in spring the Belarusian side presented a draft agreement on facilitating visa procedures. The agreement specifies clauses stipulated by the European Union’s similar agreements with Eastern Partnership countries, with Russia, and by the European Union’s existing Visa Code. At the same time the draft agreement prepared by Belarus presented several clauses, which are stipulated by the draft amendments to the Visa Code that the European Commission had prepared.

“The negotiation process is quite complicated,” said the Belarusian Deputy Foreign Minister. “We believe and it is our principled view that the agreement on facilitating visa procedures should be based on principles of equality and non-discrimination similarly to the European Union’s agreements with other countries. But the key purpose is to simplify the issuance of visas to citizens of Belarus and undoubtedly to citizens of the European Union”. Yelena Kupchina also remarked that work was in progress to bring views of the sides on both agreements closer to each other.