Businessmen who do business in hot spots of the world need backing of the state. Not always a financial one, but definitely an informational one. After all, the situation in the countries where they work changes with the velocity of light, and absence of the contacts with the new authorities can lead to loss of business. This question is urgent rather for companies who just enter the market, and not for huge corporations that have been working in instable regions for a long time. Businessmen expect two things: the state should provide information (including one from the intelligence) and lobby their interests.

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Alyaksandr Lukashenka does not exclude the possibility of adjustment “of certain directions of foreign policy of Belarus” in connection with the NATO’s expansion. At the same time the Belarusian leader noted that “It seems like Russia and Ukraine started runnnig to the NATO, but it does not mean that we should run after them”. “We cannot turn our policy to the opposite direction. At this point time-serving cannot be tolerated, otherwise we would lose face, disgrace ourselves”, - said Lukashenka. As said by him, Belarus should determine its position clearly and “frankly” declare it.

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Managers of a number of Belarusian armament plants of Belarus and military experts participate in the work of the international exhibition of land forces arms "Russian Expo Arms - 2002", which opened on July 9 in Nizhnij Tagil.

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He head of Russian Foreign Ministry believes that it would be expedient to base the relations between Russia and Belarus on the pattern of the European Union. “New principles of relations should be constructed by the two independent states. From our point of view, it would be more reasonable to follow the direction of the structures that have proven their vitality, the European union in particular,” – said Igor Ivanov. He added that “first of all it is important to develop the economical cooperation, unify the legal sphere, and only then to come to the level of supranational institutions”. “It is the highest stage of integration”, - he said in his interview to the Izvestia newspaper on July, 10.

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Today at the session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the OSCE a resolution with very firm wording on the situation in Belarus can be adopted today. Yesterday the rough copy of this resolution was supported by the majority of the participants of the Political Committee of the PA OSCE session. The text of the resolution differs from the previous ones and is not restricted to the establishing a fact of human rights violations in Belarus. In the draft of the resolution of the PA OSCE trade in arms and disappearances of opposition leaders are mentioned for the firs time.

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In Berlin Liudmila Karpenka and Volga Zakharenka met the Chair of the Ad Hoc committee on Belarus of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly Mrs. Uta Zapf, representatives of the American delegation to the PA OSCE and Johannes Rau, President of the Federal Republic of Germany. You must remember that the wives of the disappeared politicians insist on creating an independent international commission to investigate the “loud cases”.

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It was said by Mikhail Lyavonau’s relatives who refer to his attorneys. As said by the attorneys, it is not known exactly why the Public Prosecutor’s Office has prolonged the term of imprisonment of the former director again.

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“We demand not to make haste in incorporating departmental cultural institutions to the state system”. It is said in the appeal of the heads of cultural institutions of the independent sector forwarded to A.Lukashenka today. As the authors believe, the “Council of Ministers of Belarus is carrying out a campaign for integrating the palaces of culture controlled by plants and factories into the state system of cultural institutions, though no financial conditions have been prepared for that”.

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