BNS: Tuesday’s highlights 15min.lt

Spread of the virus. The coronavirus was confirmed in 23 people last day. The virus outbreak has spread in Lithuania’s Grand Duke Kęstutis battalion in Tauragė district: 11 new cases of coronavirus have been identified for recruits. Latvia confirmed eight cases per day, Estonia – 20, Belarus – 119, Poland – 550, Russia – 4,729.

Teaching research. The Ministry of Health has commissioned the National Public Health Laboratory to issue more than 50,000. rapid tests for municipalities in the country to screen teachers for COVID-19 infection. Some doctors and education unions question the benefits of such tests because rapid tests are not adequate to diagnose an existing disease, but can only show whether a person has antibodies to the virus.

Situation in Belarus:

• At the beginning of the new school year, hundreds of Belarusian students marched in Minsk to protest against the government of President Aliaksandr Lukashenko. Police detained about 10 students.
• During his visit to the western city of Baranovichi, Lukashenko said he hoped to reach an agreement with Russia on tariffs that would allow Belarusian cargo currently transported through Lithuania to pass through it. The Lithuanian government says that in this way Minsk would damage its fragile economy. “It just came to our notice then. But we can agree on tariffs with the Russians, and they will still benefit from our transshipment volumes,” Lukashenko said.
• Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that the constitutional reform proposed by Lukashenko is the correct way to resolve the crisis in the country. Speaking at the Moscow Institute of International Relations, he also claimed that Lithuanians were “working in an undemocratic manner” with the opposition candidate in the presidential elections, Sviatlana Cichanouskaja. Lithuanian Foreign Minister Linas Linkevičius strictly rejected such accusations; according to him, the Lithuanian government only dealt with the safety of S. Cichanouskaja and acts completely independently.

• The headquarters of Viktor Babaryka, a former presidential candidate arrested in Belarus, has announced the formation of a new party. The party will be called “Together”. Babaryka previously led the Belgazprombank bank, which is closely related to the Russian gas company Gazprom. S.Cichanouskaja welcomed the establishment of the party, but stressed that he did not agree with V. Babaryka’s statement that the main goal should be constitutional reform. According to her, the main objective should be new elections, the withdrawal of Lukashenko and the release of political prisoners, and “constitutional reforms and everything else after that.” Some observers say that the formation of a new party could divide the Belarusian opposition.
• Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov has announced that he is in talks with the Belarusian minister to refinance Minsk’s debt to Moscow.
• President Gitan Nauseda wrote to the UN Secretary General, António Guterres, about the situation in Belarus. He called on the UN Human Rights Council to convene an urgent debate on the human rights situation in Belarus.

September 1st. Due to the restrictions introduced, the new school year started more modestly than usual in Lithuanian schools. To handle the threats of the coronavirus, schools are trying to limit the flow of students, extend breaks, change movement aisles, and order meals. Prime Minister Saulius Skvernelis called on pupils and students to “protect themselves, their teachers and professors and responsibly comply with all safety requirements established in schools.” College freshmen will start the academic year a little later this year, on September 14.

Boycott of Astravo. The Lithuanian and Estonian Ministries of Energy announced that the three Baltic states had agreed in principle measures to ensure that Belarusian electricity did not enter the Baltic electricity market when electricity generation began at the Astrava nuclear power plant.

Lukiškės beach. The Vilnius Municipality has started to dismantle the controversial artificial beach at Lukiškės Square.

Air police. At the Air Force Aviation Base in Šiauliai, a ceremony was held for the change of military units carrying out the NATO air police mission in the Baltic States. The Italian soldiers who arrived in Lithuania took over the mission from Spain and the United Kingdom. The Italians will protect the airspace of the Baltic countries for eight months with four F-2000 EuroFighter fighters. German fighters will patrol Estonia.

The Polish decision. Poland approved the new German ambassador after a three-month delay. According to Polish media, the ruling Law and Justice party has long been hesitant to accept the mandate of Ambassador Arndt Freytag von Loringhoven because his father was an officer in the German Nazi army during the war.

Support for Taiwan. The President of the Czech Senate, Milos Vystrchil, in a solemn speech in the Taiwanese Parliament, capped the visit of a delegation of Czech politicians to the country, despite strong indignation from China. “I am Taiwanese”, concluded the politician, provoking a great ovation from the parliamentarians. The senator, who belongs to the opposition party, says that during his visit he wants to emphasize the sovereignty of the Czech Republic, because his country “should not listen to the orders of another country, especially a non-democratic state.” China’s foreign minister has threatened that Wystrchil will pay a high price for a visit to Taiwan. Beijing views Taiwan as part of Chinese territory and seeks to isolate it from the rest of the world diplomatically and economically.

Debate in the United States. As the campaign for the US presidential election gains momentum, Democratic candidate Joe Biden has accused Head of State Donald Trump of inciting violence in the country during weeks of bloody unrest. “The fires are on fire and we have a president who lights the flames instead of fighting them,” Biden said in Pittsburgh, a crucial election in Pennsylvania. Trump, for his part, said Biden blamed police and law enforcement for the violence rather than left-wing radicals.

Cartoons in France. The French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, the target of a bloody Islamist attack in January 2015, announced the reissue of controversial cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad. Thus, the publication will commemorate the beginning of the trial of the alleged accomplices of the attack.

Danish protest. The Danish government asked the Russian ambassador to protest an airspace violation last week when a Russian fighter jet flew into an area over the island of Bornholm.