The Belarusian Culture Ministry welcomes the participation of South African movies in the 15th film festival Listapad in Minsk, Culture Minister of Belarus Vladimir Matveichuk said at the official meeting with Minister of Arts and Culture of the Republic of South Africa Pallo Jordan on July 9. The South African cinema will be presented at the film festival in Minsk for the first time.

According to Vladimir Matveichuk, Listapad-2009 film festival will be special not only because the Belarusians will have an opportunity to get familiar with the South African cinema. In 2009, the festival will mark its anniversary. President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko is expected to take part in this forum. Pallo Jordan explained that South Africa cannot make 10 films a year like Belarus does, but the movies created in this country are never left unnoticed by the international cinema community.

Pallo Jordan underlined that “the development of cultural relations is one of the best ways to achieve mutual understanding.” He said that the problems in the cultural area in South Africa greatly differ from the problems that the Belarusians have to face. “The population of South Africa is multinational and multiconfessional. Our citizens often do not have an access to the cultural heritage of our country. Apart from that, the literacy level of the South Africans is still rather low,” he said.

Pallo Jordan added that the development of new information technologies help bring the nations closer. The National Library of Belarus is a major information centre and by August 2008, the National Library of South Africa will also have been improved in order to enable the people of this African country to use the information resources of the library to the full extent.

The ministers share the opinion that the most important result of Pallo Jordan’s visit to Belarus will be signing cooperation agreements in the cultural area between the two states.