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On 27 September in New York, Lithuanian Minister of Foreign Affairs Petras Vaitiekūnas met with Portuguese Foreign Minister Luis Amado, whose country currently holds the European Union Presidency. The Ministers discussed important issues of the meeting of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the EU with their Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov. On 27 September P.Vaitiekūnas also took part in the United Nations high level meeting, dedicated to the 10th anniversary of the signing of the Chemical Weapons Convention.

The Minister expressed thoughts on symbolical meaning of Memorial for All Victims of Chemical Weapons in the Hague and talked about his hopes that the tragedies of Ypres or Halabja should never be repeated.

P.Vaitiekūnas is certain that the implementation of this Convention and the contribution of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons to the peace and security in the world can be called a success story without any doubt.

The Minister indicated that the progress implementing the Chemical Weapons Convention was achieved both, at the international and national levels, and encouraged the member states of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons to make every effort to continue implementing this Convention successfully.

P.Vaitiekūnas also drew the attention of the world community to the environmental threat by the existing chemical weapons.

„The environmental threat by the chemical weapons dumped in the Baltic Sea should be understood as a challenge to the whole international community,” stressed the Head of Lithuanian diplomacy.

The Minister said he expected that the anniversary of this Convention would encourage doubling the efforts of strengthening multilateral cooperation in the area of disarmament and limiting the production and proliferation of such weapons of mass destruction, curbing their effects on history.