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On 4-5 July, the Political Director at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania Rolandas Kačinskas attended an informal meeting of EU Political Directors in Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia.

In the meeting, Kačinskas said that now, in a new situation, it was more essential than ever before for the EU to stand in unity and solidarity, and to shape and implement a short-term EU foreign policy agenda, so that no one would doubt the viability and continuity of the international system based on respect for international law and countries’ independent decision-making.

“Support for Ukraine, a principled position towards Russia, implementing a visa-free regime for Georgia, strategic communication, increasing our capacity to counter emerging external threats in the EU and its neighbourhood, and maintaining EU’s open door policy – those are the issues that Lithuania will continue to raise at the EU’s Foreign Affairs Council meetings,” said the Political Director.

Kačinskas also drew attention to the increasing importance of the transatlantic relationship and assured his counterparts that Lithuania would contribute to finding the best solutions for those and other important foreign policy issues, such as migration, terrorism prevention, ending the civil war in Syria, consolidating stability in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the Middle East peace process.

In a separate session of the meeting, the EU Political Directors welcomed positive developments in Belarus and the EU’s possible next steps towards cooperation with Belarus. Kačinskas stressed that lifting EU sanctions against Belarus did not mean that the EU was to abandon its joint position on human rights and democratic elections in Belarus. The Lithuanian representative also emphasized that visa free travel would facilitate people-to-people contacts and raised the issue of safety and security of the Astravets nuclear power plant in Belarus.

The meeting, which was traditionally held by the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, discussed the EU’s Common Foreign and Security Policy agenda for the next half of the year 2016.