The Minister of Defence of Lithuania Rasa Jukneviciene maintains that neither Lithuania, nor other countries in the region perceive Russia as an enemy.
“Neither Lithuania, nor other countries in the region consider Russia an enemy and constitute a threat to it. We want the region to be peaceful. Meanwhile, Russia has been militarising its territories. For the past few years, a marked increase in activity of Russian Air Forces has been observed above the Baltic Sea. I am stressing that it is not only fighter jets that perform the flights. Last year, we observed heavy bombers, which we haven’t seen from the Cold War,” the Minister said in an interview to Lietuvos Zinios daily on 30 July.
“I would not describe it as a threat, however, I am holding a realistic view of the regional situation. That’s what I see: Russia has been intensively reforming its Armed Forces since 2007, and the bulk of the reforms are held in the Western direction – at Finnish, Estonian, Latvian borders and its Kaliningrad region,” the defense minister continued. ”This would be a threat, if Lithuania was alone. However, our country is currently a member of NATO, and the Alliance has sufficient capacities to counter such types of ammunition attacks, if any take place. I hope they will never happen,” Jukneviciene said.
