Фото: МИД
Belarusian Deputy Foreign Minister Ihar Sakreta shared with Hintergrund magazine the story of an unsuccessful attempt to speak with his Lithuanian counterpart during an OSCE meeting. According to him, she chose to attend an event featuring Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya instead.
“Last year, when I was in Vienna for an official meeting within the framework of the OSCE, my colleague, the Deputy Foreign Minister of Lithuania, was sitting directly opposite me in the conference hall — face to face. I discreetly signalled to her: ‘Let’s step aside for a minute, have a coffee and discuss practical, pressing issues.’ Do you know what she did? She categorically refused to speak with me. Instead, she preferred to attend Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya’s political public relations event. She refused to meet with the official representative of a neighbouring country.
Shortly afterwards, my Finnish colleague, also a deputy foreign minister, approached me in the corridor and diplomatically asked: ‘Ihar, perhaps I should serve as an official mediator between you and Lithuania?’
I looked at him and said: ‘Wait. We are not at war. Our diplomatic relations have not been severed. Why would we need mediators? If she agrees, we can simply speak directly.’ Later, the Lithuanian side issued an official statement saying that sitting down at the negotiating table with me would amount to a ‘defeat’ for Lithuania. For them, mind you! Not for me,” he said.
Sakreta said he was later able to return the favour by declining to travel to Washington for a meeting with the Lithuanian side.
“Recently, I was seriously invited to meet with the Deputy Foreign Minister of Lithuania for diplomatic consultations in Washington.
Just imagine the distances: from Minsk to the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius, is closer than the journey to my parents’ home in a Belarusian village. To visit my parents, I have to travel 170 kilometres. The Lithuanian border is only 150 kilometres from Minsk. The Lithuanian government is geographically closer to me than my own mother!
And in this situation we are expected to fly to Istanbul and then to Washington to hold a meeting on American soil between two immediate European neighbours? Is that still normal? Is this the much-praised European rationality?” he said.