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EBRD Board delegation visits Belarus
A delegation of the EBRD Board of Directors arrives in Minsk today (Sunday) at
the start of a four-day fact-finding mission to Belarus which will include
meetings with senior officials and representatives of the business and
diplomatic communities, as well as NGOs.
The object of the visit is to gather information to help prepare the EBRD’s
upcoming Belarus strategy covering the next two years. The Board of Directors
represents the Bank's 62 public shareholders and approves all Bank projects
and country strategies.
The delegation will include Konstantin Andreopoulos (European Investment
Bank), Ohad Bar-Efrat (Israel/Austria/Cyprus/Malta/Kazakhstan/Bosnia &
Herzegovina), Scott Clark (Canada/Morocco), Sven Hegelund
(Sweden/Iceland/Estonia), Marc Julien (France), Enzo Quattrociocche (Italy),
Kaarina Rautala (Finland/Norway/Latvia), Hidde van der Veer
(Netherlands/Mongolia) and Igor Kovtun, (Russian Federation/Tajikistan), who
also represents Belarus on the EBRD Board.
The delegation will report its findings on the current situation in Belarus to
the full Board of Directors, which will subsequently consider the future
course of the Bank’s activities in Belarus.
The last Belarus strategy was approved in May 2002, when the EBRD expressed
serious concern about the political situation and slow pace of transition to a
market economy. At the time, the Bank said that unless the authorities made
substantive progress to improve political and economic conditions in the
country, the EBRD would not be able to move beyond the financing of
private-sector projects. The full strategy may be viewed at www.ebrd.com.
The EBRD’s cumulative investments in Belarus stand at €157 million.
In 2003, the Bank arranged the first international syndication for a
Belarussian borrower, raising $36 million for Priorbank, the country’s largest
bank. The EBRD was the lender of record for the full amount, and syndicated
$24 million to six international banks. The money was earmarked for short and
medium-term loans to Priorbank’s private sector clients in Belarus.
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