Пресс-секретарь МИД Руслан Варанков. Фото: facebook.com/belarusmfa
The Belarusian Foreign Ministry believes that there are still grounds for holding consultations with Lithuania at the ministerial level. This was stated by the press secretary of the Belarusian foreign ministry, Ruslan Varankou. According to him, Lithuania violated its international legal obligations both in closing and reopening the border.
“We remind that the decision to close the border was taken unilaterally by the Lithuanian side, was purely politicized, and was made outside the procedures and timeframes established by existing international agreements. For example, according to the bilateral agreement on border crossing points, official notification of such actions must be sent in advance: from one to five days depending on the situation,” he said.
Varankou emphasized that the reopening of the border crossing points was also carried out without following the prescribed procedures.
“The current decision to resume operations of the ‘Šalčininkai’ and ‘Medininkai’ crossing points (from the Belarusian side – ‘Benyakoni’ and ‘Kamenny Loh’) was again made in violation of established procedures. This once more demonstrates the Lithuanian side’s disregard for its international legal obligations,” he added.
Considering that the Lithuanian side has stated the possibility of closing the crossing points again, the Belarusian Foreign Ministry still considers ministerial-level consultations relevant.
“In this regard, the proposal from the Belarusian side to hold consultations at the level of foreign ministries of the two countries to develop a sustainable solution for the functioning of the crossing points on the Belarus-Lithuania border and to prevent similar situations in the future remains relevant. We, the Republic of Belarus and the Republic of Lithuania, need a border that unites rather than divides peoples! We base our approach on this. Everything depends on the Lithuanian authorities,” Varankou noted.
It is recalled that the Belarusian Foreign Ministry had already made such a proposal, but Lithuania did not respond. As a result, contacts on Tuesday took place at the level of deputy officials responsible for border matters.