John Coale: US wants to reopen its embassy in Minsk

The United States wants to reopen its embassy in Minsk and normalize relations with Belarus, US Presidential Envoy John Coale said following the meeting with Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko, Report informs referring to BelTA.  

John Coale described his meeting with the Belarusian president as extremely productive. "It was much like my recent meeting with US President Trump. We discussed this trip, our visit, and the possibility of a meeting with the president of Belarus," he said. "The paramount objective of our engagement is to normalize bilateral relations between the Republic of Belarus and the United States. This means taking every possible step to deepen and strengthen our economic and political cooperation." 

John Coale expressed satisfaction with the results of his meeting with Aleksandr Lukashenko and is confident that President Trump will be similarly pleased once he is briefed on the outcomes.

"The presidents of Belarus and the United States are the kind of leaders who are doing everything to normalize our relations and to focus not on differences, but on common ground," stated John Coale.

He described the current relations between Belarus and the United States as good, but not great. "There is still much that can be done to further normalize and improve these relations. We want to reopen our embassy in Minsk. We want economic relations and trade between our countries to develop. If any differences or disagreements exist between our nations, let them remain submerged; they should not be brought to the surface. We are ready, and President Trump is ready, to do everything necessary to finally normalize our relations," the representative of the US president assured. 

Regarding the reopening of the US embassy in Minsk, John Coale did not provide any time-frame, as the matter remains part of an ongoing negotiation process. "I know that we want the embassy back. I know that this will happen. It is a question of the near future. We want to have an ambassador, we want to have a full embassy here, and we will work on it," the US president"s envoy said.

John Coale emphasized that the primary goal of his ongoing visit to Minsk is to announce the complete lifting of sanctions against the Belarusian airline Belavia. "We are absolutely certainly moving in the right direction. Yes, some restrictive measures remain. This is a matter of negotiations, and those negotiations will continue. We are moving in the right direction, though it will take some time to resolve these issues. This is an ongoing process," he added. 

John Coale remarked that he has developed excellent personal relations with the president of Belarus. "We can even joke. I reiterate that we are ready to do everything necessary to normalize relations and to resolve differences without dragging them into the public eye," he said.

The US president"s envoy also recalled the telephone conversation between Donald Trump and Aleksandr Lukashenko, when the US president called his Belarusian counterpart from his plane en route to Alaska. "They had a very productive conversation. We are moving in the right direction," John Coale affirmed.