OREANDA-NEWS. March 24, 2009. President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko met with President of Abkhazia Sergei Bagapsh on March 23. The meeting focused on the development of trade, economic and cultural ties.

“I have already discussed the problems, which exist in this region from the economic point of view and concern Belarus, with the President of Russia. There are a lot of things to discuss and primarily economic ones. The number of things to deal with always increases after gaining independence. We will be glad if Belarus’ participation will resolve more problems, which exist in this region,” Alexander Lukashenko told Sergei Bagapsh.

In turn, the head of Abkhazia thanked Alexander Lukashenko for the meeting. “We are ready to tightly cooperate with Belarus in economic areas,” said Sergei Bagapsh. He informed the Belarusian head of state about Abkhazia’s purchases of Belarusian mechanical engineering products last year. They were mainly tractors and loaders.

This year Abkhazia is interested in buying a large batch of MAZ automobiles. “We are ready to spend one billion Russian rubles on them. We can afford it today. We will work with Belarus. It is convenient for us and those are quality machines,” said the President of Abkhazia.

Alexander Lukashenko and Sergei Bagapsh shared their views on the development of tourism and recreation for children as well as the establishment of cooperation in the area of higher education.