Putin’s “first” visit to be in Kazakhstan, not Belarus

• 16.05.2012, 14:03

Russian president has accepted an invitation to visit Kazakhstan on May 25.

The first country Vladimir Putin is to visit in his third presidential term, is still to be Kazakhstan, not Belarus, as local governmental mass media have rushed to inform. However the press-service of the Kremlin has confirmed today that Putin is to visit Belarus on May 31, a week earlier Russian president is to visit Kazakhstan, AFN reports.

The press-service of the Kremlin does not define it as “the first visit” or “the first country, visited by the president of the Russian Federation.”

“On May 31 Vladimir Putin is to visit Belarus on a working visit. The agreement had been reached on Tuesday during a conversation of the head of the Russian state with Belarusian president Alyaksndr Lukashenka,” the report reads.

Meanwhile, during the talks with the president of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev in the framework of the informal CIS summit yesterday, Putin accepted the invitation to visit Kazakhstan on May 25.

An passage from the verbatim record of Putin and Nazarbayev’s meeting:

“N. Nazarbayev: Mr Putin, most importantly is, that on May 25 the 20th anniversary of the basic Treaty on Freedom, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance is marked. Some of its articles are outdated, we have moved ahead in connection with creation of the Customs Union. I would like us not to miss that: we should amend and extend it. So I invite you to our country on a visit.

V. Putin: I accept it with pleasure.”

The verbatim record of Putin and Nazarbayev’s meeting is published at the website of the Kremlin. And there is no verbatim record of communication of Putin and Lukashenka there, which shows that Russian president had not found that necessary to talk to Lukashenka, or it was a strictly confidential meeting, or had “an intimate” nature (with the use of words “to bend”, “to bring to one’s knees”).