Rapota: Union State is not ready for constitution yet

MOSCOW, 1 April (BelTA) – The Union State is not ready to adopt a constitutional framework yet, State Secretary of the Union State Grigory Rapota told a press conference timed to the forthcoming Day of Unity of the Peoples of Belarus and Russia. The press conference was held in Moscow on 1 April, BelTA has learnt.

The State Secretary noted that nobody knows exactly what this constitutional framework should be about. “The treaty on the establishment of the Union State spells out that the constitutional framework can be signed after all the necessary preconditions are in place, including the single economic and social space,” he said.

Grigory Rapota noted that the adoption of the constitutional framework will require Belarus and Russia to abandon part of their sovereignty, while neither of them is ready for that. “The two countries would want to retain their sovereign rights, but the constitutional framework implies the transfer of some supranational functions. This should be preceded, among other things, by the establishment of the single energy space, single information space, and single transport space. What is, for example, the single transport space? There is no clear answer or clear understanding what it should be. To be honest, the constitutional framework is not on our agenda now, we need to deal with other issues first,” Grigory Rapota said.