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According to representatives of the ministry, such a decision was made because, otherwise, Belarus threatened to declare Lithuanian diplomats undesirable, which would have limited their job opportunities in the future.
Ten days ago, Belarus withdrew its ambassadors from Vilnius and Warsaw and asked Lithuania and Poland to withdraw their ambassadors and reduce the number of diplomatic staff – Vilnius demanded the withdrawal of 11 diplomats, Warsaw – 32.
Poland immediately agreed to this request, but the Lithuanian diplomatic service initially decided to limit itself to the withdrawal of six diplomats.
The spokeswoman for the Foreign Minister Rasa Jakilaitienė told BNS on Monday that Minsk did not agree to such a compromise.
“The Belarusian side did not heed our compromise proposals and continued to ultimately demand a reduction in the number of Lithuanian diplomats, and if we disagreed, they intended to declare diplomats working in Belarus undesirable, which it would severely limit the opportunities for diplomats in the future, “said Jakilaitienė.
“In view of the final demands and the removal of six more diplomats from Minsk and Grodno, our goal is to stop this process of restricting diplomatic contacts,” he said.
“As our partners in the EU, we are convinced that, especially at a time when the Belarusian regime is restricting any contact with the West, diplomatic representation in Belarus is becoming even more important,” said R. Jakilaitienė.
“We reiterate that the full responsibility for the state of diplomatic relations between the states rests with the real leadership of Belarus,” he said.
Ms Jakilaitienė also noted that EU foreign ministers adopted a “decision in principle on Monday to start the process of expanding the list of Belarusian sanctioned persons by several dozen high-ranking officials, including Aliaksandr Lukashenko.”
In solidarity with Lithuania and Poland, most of the European Union countries and Great Britain withdrew their ambassadors from Minsk.
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