By imposing sanctions against Belarus, the European Union has suspended the readmission treaty with Minsk, President Alexander Lukashenko has said.
"We reached an agreement, signed a treaty. Per this treaty, they had to build us places to stay for people, whom we will take back through readmission. And by imposing the sanctions against us, they have abandoned all of that and are not financing, not building those so-called camps," Lukashenko said in an interview with Russian magazine Natsionalnaya Oborona (National Defense), published on Saturday.
The president went on to say that Minsk was not going to bear those financial costs.
"They have violated [the treaty], they have withdrawn from this treaty, that is why you cannot expect anything out of [me], as they say. This does not involve me," Lukashenko added.
In January 2020, the EU and Belarus signed the visa facilitation and readmission agreements, which entered into force in July that year. The readmission deal aimed to boost cooperation against illegal migration by setting up procedures to return migrants who entered the EU illegally via Belarus. (ANI/Sputnik)
( With inputs from ANI )
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