News

Madame Minister,
Excellencies,
Dear Colleagues,
On behalf of the Lithuanian Government let me express the appreciation of the Swedish presidency initiative to hold this second ministerial meeting of the Northern Dimension. Its subject is important and timing is right. We have a number of useful discussion documents, including the discussion papers of the Presidency and the European Commission. I think these contributions present many useful ideas reflecting the developments since the first ministerial meeting in Helsinki. In the view of the time constraint, I would limit myself to five basic points. The first is - on a general assessment of the Northern Dimension. I can only reiterate that Lithuania has attached high importance to this EU initiative ever since its commencement. Over the last year the initiative has contributed to the momentum of cooperation in the Northern Europe and around the Baltic Sea on major projects with a shared aim to bring a sustainable development of the region. The initiative itself is developing into an important part of the Union's external policy in this part of Europe. In a sense, it has acquired an identity of its own which will further evolve as projects and ideas we are discussing are put into practise. The Action Plan adopted in Feira laid the basis for the operational side of the initiative and today we shall be concluding with some decisions to that end as well. My second point is - on Lithuania's participation in related projects. Lithuania is working on joint projects with all Northern Dimension partners. To name just a few such undertakings: in environment - it is the Nemunas river basin management project with participation of the USA, Sweden, Russia; in energy - projecting the power systems' connection with Poland - the undertaking with clear implications to the Baltic Ring concept; in transport - I would like to mention "Rail Baltica" - a new generation railway connection - an increasingly important route for Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. Energy and transport are the sectorial priorities for Lithuania. Additional progress is needed, especially in transport. Support from ISPA - also in the context of TINA - is to play a crucial role both for concrete projects and as a prelude for structural assistance after accession. Both priorities are central in the process of enlargement and will remain so after enlargement. Thirdly, few words on Kaliningrad Region. Placing Kaliningrad to the priorities in the Feira Action Plan added opens further way for developments in and around this region. For us Kaliningrad - an immediate and natural partner - had been continuously pivotal well before Feira. After Helsinki, together with our Russian partners we started the so-called Nida initiative, which is composed of a variety of joint projects and their regular monitoring. A few weeks ago a set of joint projects has been updated. Together with Russia we singled out 5 priority projects from the "Nida Initiative" ("Nida II"). Information about them is available on paper in this room. Some of them will be implemented together with Poland. The geography of practical cooperation around the Kaliningrad region has since then expanded. Important contributions to cooperation involving Kaliningrad region have been pledged and made by the Swedish, Danish and Finnish Governments. Lithuania has welcomed the European Commission's Communication on Kaliningrad. It offers a good set of ideas for further discussion and for appropriate formats for such discussion. There is a developed network of bilateral channels which, if necessary and needed, can be complemented with multilateral formulas. The fourth point is on aligning of financial instruments. The Northern Dimension initiative has encouraged discussion on efficiency and interoperability of Phare, Tacis and Interreg. I can exemplify the problem by the Lithuanian-Russian project to build a cross-border bridge over river Nemunas: using existing EU support instruments we would be able to build Lithuanian part while different programming specificities prevented our Russian partners to finance their part. Familiar situation is with the border-crossing post. Lithuania and the EU have already allocated 3 and 2 million EUR respectively for a new post in Panemunė while Russia cannot modernise its part. As a result, we will have improved quality of border control on our side but queues will remain because of the bottleneck on the Russian side. Half bridge is no bridge. Also building a new border-crossing post only on one side would be useless, which forces us to search for solutions. This bridge could, in fact, become a pilot Northern Dimension project combining different EU instruments.Lithuania has been consistent in this regard. Funds from the national budget as well as from Phare national program have been allocated for the Northern Dimension projects. We commend what the European Commission is doing towards single programming and bringing the procedures of assistance programmes together. Establishment of the Tacis office in Kaliningrad is a right decision. Together with Commission and our Russian friends we have to give some thought about having a kind of "Tacis - Northern Dimension" sub-programme. Among other things these practical issues of Lithuanian-Russian cooperation were emphasised a week ago during the meeting of the presidents of Lithuania and Russia in Moscow. My fifth point is on institutional framework and a follow-up. While continuing strengthening of the Northern dimension process we also shall assign an appropriate role for Council of the Baltic Sea States (CBSS) in implementation of the Northern Dimension projects. Some of the areas targeted by the Northern Dimension are specifically dealt with in the CBSS as exemplified by the contribution of the CBSS for this meeting. It is my understanding that there are possibilities to synchronise activities under the Northern Dimension and CBSS and to build on the Swedish proposal to hold regular ministerial meetings on the Northern Dimension. They could go hand in hand with bi-annual summits of the CBSS. Needless to say - it is of great importance to continue having such a meetings and to have all EU member-states around the table together with candidate countries, Nordic countries and Russia. I am convinced that the importance of the Northern Dimension is bound to grow after EU enlargement. We must necessarily follow up on good ideas and pragmatic proposals, which we hear today and which, I believe, will be summed up by the Swedish Presidency. Thank you.