Despite his rather youthful appearance (and portly stature), Ambassador Evgeny Shestakov is a seasoned diplomat, having been a career diplomat for the past 21 years.

When Belarus became an independent state after the collapse of the USSR in 1991, everything had to be started from scratch, albeit by that time the country had had its own foreign service as a Soviet republic since 1944.

Mr Shestakov was Director of the Department for organizational work and documentation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs after serving in various positions at Belarusian embassies in Vilnius and Moscow. In 2008 he became Ambassador to Italy and to the UN’s FAO, adding Malta to his responsibilities in 2011.

The situation in his home country, he told me in an interview, is ‘absolutely stable’. It is ‘an island of peace and stability in Europe’ although, being an ‘open economy’ it is open to influences, positive or negative, coming from neighbouring countries.

Its GDP growth averages around five per cent every year, though this year may be somewhat less because of the crisis in the EU. The EU has avoided a full-scale crisis but there persist some negative moments as, for instance, regards Italy.

The Belarusian economy is based on a core of state-owned companies mostly in a highly developed industrial complex, including such key industries as mechanical engineering, chemical and petrochemical, light industry, as well as a strong food and agricultural industry, which specializes in meat farming and dairy production.

The Western media has been making many noises regarding a presumed conflict between Belarus and Russia but all that this boils down to is an issue between two companies involved in potassium trading, one from each country, which is now being resolved between them.

Belarus is a member of a Customs Union and a Common Economic Space that is very similar to the former EEC, which also comprises Russia and Kazakhstan. All goods that enter Belarus can pass on to the other member states with no Customs formalities: in that sense Belarus serves as the frontier for the entrance of any goods from the EU to the entire economic space.

For some time now, Belarus has had a bad press in the EU amid claims of lack of democracy, an authoritarian government and the like.

Belarus rejects this and rebuts that everything in the country is run according to the Constitution and the Belarusian way of life. The mainline philosophy of every country has its specifics –All human rights are observed, media is free and access to Internet is free except in the case of terrorist-linked websites.

“Belarus respects the EU position and the EU should respect Belarus in return. There is a constant critical dialogue with the EU,” Mr Shestakov stressed.

The ambassador referred to the upcoming summit of the Eastern Partnership, which will be held in late autumn in Vilnius.

“This is a very good initiative that allows the members of this partnership to benefit from this interesting project but only as long as all members are treated as equals and on the same level. Belarus still has to decide on the level of its participation,” the ambassador said.

“If the same conditions apply to all participants and there are no attempts to choose between participating countries, Belarus has no pressure from Russia as regards its participation in this summit.”

All summits bring about change and, as exports are crucial for Belarus, participation at this summit should be fruitful for Belarus as well as for other participating countries.

As regards Belarusian relations with Malta, Mr Shestakov reminded me that he is a non-resident ambassador but relations between the two countries have been excellent and are getting better, especially those regarding bilateral relations despite the fact that the two countries are not close neighbours and differ in every other aspect: his country is landlocked while Malta is an island. They come from different poles of influences: Malta is an EU-member state and Belarus is the neighbour of three EU states – Poland, Lithuania and Latvia – while having borders too with Russia and the Ukraine.

“Belarus tries to be a good neighbour with all its neighbours, and adopts its economy to events around it. The two sides look at every possible niche to foster sufficient growth in bilateral trade in the near future. Malta is seen as having privileged access to North Africa since the Maltese internal market is not as great as some big cities. There exist good possibilities for trade in potassium, chemical products, some final oil products and tools for industry.

As regards the development of tourist links, there are, so far, no direct flights between the two countries and the closest airport for flights from Malta is in Lithuania and then only in summer. Tourist companies however can always organise charter flights and the Belarusian national airline “Belavia” has four flights a week from Minsk to Rome and to Milan.

As regards visa problems, Maltese nationals can go to Minsk airport on arrival and apply to get a visa there. One can also apply for a visa through the consular office of the Belarusian Embassy in Rome. Belarusian citizens who want to visit Malta can apply to the Italian Embassy in Minsk.

Despite all this, there are many ongoing people-to-people contacts between the two countries. Lifecycle, for instance, has just been in Belarus, and Valletta FC has played against Minsk. There has also been a water polo game between Maltese and Belarusian athletes. There are also some Belarusian nationals living in Malta.

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries in February 1993.

Being the second ambassador of his country to Malta, Mr Shestakov tries to come regularly to Malta and is in daily contact with the honorary consulate here.

The Belarusian Chamber of Commerce has its representative here and so far there is no joint Chamber of Commerce between the two countries but plans are afoot to set one up in the near future, as well as to sign an agreement on the cooperation between the two chambers.

Trade between the two countries is not so significant and varies from technical equipment to chemical products.