On 14 August, Minister of Foreign Affairs Linas Linkevičius took part in an extraordinary Foreign Affairs Council convened via a video conference to discuss the critical situation in Belarus and renewed tensions in the east of the Mediterranean.

“Having taken into consideration the information acquired by our institutions and partners, we may conclude that ‘Hezbollah’ uses terrorist means that pose threat to the security of a significant number of countries, including Lithuania. We stand together with the United States of America, Germany, United Kingdom, Netherlands, as well as other countries that had reached the same conclusion”, – Mr. Linas Linkevičius, Lithuania’s Foreign Minister, said in a statement. “We appreciate the successful cooperation between the Lithuanian and Israeli national security agencies. We are thankful to these institutions for their significant work in helping ensure the safety of our citizens”, – said Mr. Linkevičius.

The Foreign Ministers of Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway and Sweden, in the context of the developments that are taking place in Belarus, express their grave concern about the violence against post-election demonstrations that have occurred in response to reports of widespread electoral fraud. We are very troubled by the reports of physical injuries inflicted on the demonstrators.

As Foreign Ministers of Lublin Triangle States, we are deeply concerned with escalation of the situation in Belarus after the presidential elections and call upon the authorities to refrain from the use of force and to release all those detained last night.

We continue to observe the situation in Belarus, where presidential elections took place on the 9^th of August. The elections did not comply with the international commitments of Belarus and globally recognised standards of democracy, and they were not free and fair.

The Minister of Foreign Affairs Linas Linkevičius had a phone conversation with the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell to discuss the worrying situation in Belarus. Mr Linkevičius highlighted the importance of co-ordination and joint actions by the European Union (EU) while responding to events in Belarus.

On 7 August the Embassy of Belarus was presented with a protest note by the Lithuanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which strongly condemns Belarus’s actions to begin the loading of nuclear fuel into the unsafe nuclear power plant at the Astravets site in Belarus.