BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

13/12/2007

Kremlin: constitutional act on Russia-Belarus merger not on agenda

MOSCOW (AP) - A Kremlin briefing paper released Thursday said that a constitutional act on merging Russia and Belarus is not on the agenda for a meeting to be attended by the two countries' presidents.

Russian President Vladimir Putin travels to Minsk on Thursday for a meeting with Belarus' president that many observers had speculated would move forward long-dormant plans to form a union state of the former Soviet republics.

That raised suggestions that Putin, who is to step down as Russian president after next spring's elections, could return to power as leader of a newly formed country.

But "despite information spread in the mass media, the question of a constitutional act of the union state is not on the agenda. No kind of discussion of this question is expected," said the paper circulated to media in Russia by the Kremlin.

Source:

http://www.kyivpost.com/bn/27998/