OREANDA-NEWS. February 29, 2008. Belarus and Syria can fill cooperation with new economic projects, Prime Minister of Belarus Sergei Sidorsky said during a meeting with Minister of Economy and Trade of the Syrian Arab Republic Amer Hosni Lutfi, who co-chairs the joint Belarusian-Syrian commission for trade, economic and technical cooperation, reported the Official website www.government.by.

“We have many interesting proposals and projects to develop trade and economic relations with Syria. I am ready to discuss these proposals with you,” Sergei Sidorsky said. According to him, trade between Belarus and Syria, which amounted to $46,8 million in 2007, “is not big and cannot satisfy Belarus”. In this respect the work of the bilateral commission will help promote cooperation and fill it with new content.

Sergei Sidorsky noted good contacts between the countries. Increasing foreign commodity trade of Belarus ($53 billion in 2007) shows that the economy has been growing and that there is the potential to develop bilateral links with Syria, he believes.

In turn, Minister of Economy and Syria Amer Hosni Lutfi said that the good relations between the heads of state of the two countries bear well on the development of trade and economic cooperation of the two countries and at the same time lay additional responsibility on the commission

According to Mr Amer Hosni Lutfi, “it is necessary to take more efforts to give more exposure to the machinery construction potential.” This aim in mind, the sides decided to exchange exhibitions of machinery construction companies.

During the visit to Belarus the Minister of Economy and Trade of Syria toured of Belarusian Autoworks (BelAZ trademark). He will inform the Syrian authorities about the potential of this company and also about the prospects of the delivery of Belarusian heavy haulers to Syria. He also praised the work of the Belarusian-Syrian business council.

According to Amer Hosni Lutfi, the government of his country “will provide certain assistance in increasing the deliveries of phosphates and chemical fibres to Belarus and also purchases of BelAZ vehicles. Belarus and Syria have a big potential in trade and the commission will stimulate this process.

He also informed that in order to intensify business cooperation the Syrian side “is studying the ways of increasing bilateral trade by means of creating a free trade zone between Belarus and Syria”. This project is at its initial stage and needs to be developed, the Syrian official said.