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Belarus said to have borrowed $200m from Azerbaijan for 12 days

The $200-million loan that Azerbaijan granted to Belarus for paying off its debt for Russian gas deliveries was for a period of 12 days, Azer Gasymov, spokesman for the Azerbaijani president, told Azerbaijan’s Trend News Agency on Tuesday, as quoted by BelaPAN.

“On June 21, Belarusian Prime Minister Syarhey Sidorski asked the prime minister of the Azerbaijani Republic, Artur Rasizade, to grant Belarus a short-term loan because of the situation that had emerged,” the spokesman said. “That was reported to the president of the Azerbaijani Republic. Given the friendly relations between our countries, President Ilham Aliyev gave his consent to providing this loan.”

“The loan amounted to $200 million and was granted for a period of 12 days,” Mr. Gasymov said. “All necessary documents were signed regarding this loan.”

The spokesman did not say what interest rate the loan carried.

On June 22, Alyaksandr Lukashenka said that he had borrowed from his "friends" to repay Belarus' $187-million debt for Russian natural gas.

"It's sad that we had to borrow the money from strangers – they gave it to us within one day – while Russia couldn't wait for two weeks," Mr. Lukashenka told Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

In an interview with EuroNews two days later, the Belarusian leader revealed that the friends were Azerbaijan. “Our allies, who are the closest people to us, said: ‘No, we won’t wait for a single day.’ I applied to Ilham Aliyev, the president of Azerbaijan. He lent me $200 million within a day, even less than a day,” he said.