"Expulsion from the General System of Preferences is more likely, to be a political measure”
27.09.2007 | Publications
According to the European Commission, annual losses of Belarus caused by its expulsion from the General System of preferences of the European Union will make about 12 million euro. The representative of Eurocommission has declared in particular: «We have received various information on the prospective losses. Even the sum of 300 million euro was mentioned. According to our data, annual losses of Belarus will make about 12 million euro, i.e. about 0,4 % of the total Belarusian export to the European Union.
"Expulsion
from the General System of Preferences is more likely, to be a political
measure”
“It is the small sum. But expulsion from the General System of Preferences is more likely a political measure ", the representative of Eurocommission remarked.
Similar opinion was earlier stated by chairman of the Belarusian congress of democratic trade unions Alyaksandr Yarashuk «to the Radio Svaboda.
“From my point of view, here we deal not with material losses – I consider, that they are due to be much less, than 400 or 300 million – here we deal with material losses to be born by our country, our government. It is a strong impact on image of the country. Here political losses are much hire, than economic. Probably that caused such nervous official response of the Belarus party to this decision”.
The decision on Belarus deprivation of trading privileges was adopted on 20 December, 2006 with its coming into force delayed for half a year. However, at the conference of the International Association of Labor which is annually held in Geneva from 30 May till 15 June, “absence of progress in the field of the right to freedom of associations in Belarus” was admitted. Therefore, on 21 June, 2007 the decision on expulsion of Belarus from the General System of preferences of the European Union has come into force.
It is possible to get the preferences back “through introduction of positive changes and observation of the rights of workers”The Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Belarus declared earlier, that the decision of the European Union is not to become a serious challenge for the economy and citizens of Belarus. According to the declaration of the Belarusian foreign policy body of 21 June, 2007, Belarus regards this decision as temporal and considers that objective necessity for adjustment and development of good-neighborhood cooperation with Belarus will lead the European Union to faster revision of the sanctions and their further canceling.
The representative of Eurocommission has noticed in this connection: “The fact, that the preferences are possible to be returned, is good stimulus for the government of Belarus to introduce positive changes and to observe the workers’ rights”.
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