News

On 22 October in Vienna, Lithuania’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Vygaudas Ušackas addressed the Permanent Council of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and met with the highest-ranking OSCE officials and heads of the delegations of the OSCE participating States.

The goal of this visit is to discuss the OSCE Ministerial Council, which will be held on 1-2 December 2009 in Athens, as well as challenges and possibilities for Lithuania’s OSCE Chairmanship in 2011.

While addressing the OSCE Permanent Council, Minister V.Ušackas highlighted that the conflict in Georgia was a signal to the OSCE participating States that the existing OSCE mechanisms of conflict prevention must be used more effectively.

The Minister stressed that the war in Georgia once again underlined the grave danger that protracted conflicts posed to the security in the OSCE area by demonstrating how quickly a situation could spiral out of control. According to the Minister, this conflict has demonstrated that the Organization’s early warning, conflict prevention and crisis management mechanisms needed to be improved.

“The ultimate goal of the OSCE is to build political will and use all the preventive mechanisms, so as not to have to deal with post-conflict rehabilitation afterwards. The tragedy in Georgia can not be repeated,” the head of Lithuania’s diplomacy said.

According to Minister V.Ušackas, the OSCE’s shared values and commitments still remained meaningful and important almost 35 years after the signing of the Helsinki Final Act.

“All participating States have pledged to defend them and to respect them in our interaction with each other and while organizing and developing our own societies. In this, we are accountable to our citizens as we are accountable to each other. Our performance, whether in consolidating the rule of law and democratic institutions internally or in our behaviour externally,  are the subject of legitimate peer review by fellow OSCE states,” Minister V.Ušackas said.

According to the Minister, the OSCE is a project that requires our constant engagement and political will. Given the scope of the challenges that we face today, we cannot afford to be complacent.

Minister V.Ušackas, who currently chairs the Council of the Baltic Sea States (CBSS), also believes that there was a significant potential for the OSCE to develop a practical co-operation with sub-regional institutions.

“We have to encourage further bilateral or regional initiatives aimed at developing relations of good neighborhood and inter-regional co-operation,” Minister V.Ušackas stated.

The dialogue on European security matters, the OSCE role in the South Caucasus, Moldova and the Balkans, the issues of guaranteeing human rights and fundamental freedoms and free elections, combating terrorism, border management and energy security matters were discussed during the meeting with OSCE Secretary General Marc Perrin de Brichambaut and other high-ranking OSCE officials. The Minister also met with Ambassadors of the OSCE participating States and OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media Miklos Haraszti.