MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia will allow Belarus to postpone debt payments totalling $1.4 billion for 10 years, while also setting a fixed interest rate, according to draft laws approved by Russian lower house of parliament, or Duma, on Tuesday.
At the start of the year, Belarus has asked Russia to restructure and refinance Minsk’s 2022 debt obligations and Moscow would move all payments, redemptions and debt servicing due between March 2022 and April 2023 to 2028-2033, Timur Maksimov, Russian deputy finance minister, told Duma.
Russia would also fix the interest rate at 12% per year instead of a floating rate tied to Russian OFZ rouble bond yields used before, he added. To become a law, the draft should pass the third reading, get approved by the Upper House of the Parliament and then get signed by President Vladimir Putin.
Belarus is Russia’s ally in what the Kremlin calls “special military operation” in Ukraine which the Moscow launched in February.
(Reporting by Elena Fabrichnaya; Editing by Tomasz Janowski)
