What Andrius spoke about.

15

Feb

2022

EN Speech

Watch

Implementation of the common foreign and security policy – annual report 2021 - Implementation of the common security and defence policy – annual report 2021 (debate)

Madam President, it is a good report, and it is important for us to understand that a major strategic goal of our foreign and security policy should be peace on the European continent. The major challenge to peace – authoritarian and aggressive Russia. New security architecture on the European continent is possible only when Russia will transform itself back to democracy. The European Union has an…

19

Jan

2022

EN Speech

Watch

Situation in Kazakhstan

Mr President, today we should speak not only about Kazakhstan, but also about all the post—Soviet post—imperial authoritarian area, which is becoming an area of brutality, oppression and blood. We know what a tragedy had happened recently in Kazakhstan, when during the period of peaceful protests, brutal riots were artificially initiated as a pretext to seek the Russian—led military deployment. Th…

16

Dec

2021

EN Speech

Watch

Continuous crackdown on civil society and human rights defenders in Russia: the case of human rights organisation Memorial

Madam President, as we know, Putin wants to destroy Memorial. Many human rights organisations were destroyed by the Kremlin up till now. But Memorial is a unique organisation which was created by Andrei Sakharov back in 1989 in order to preserve memories about the atrocities of the gulags and Stalin’s crimes. Andrei Sakharov understood in a very clear way that in order to build a new democratic po…

14

Dec

2021

EN Speech

Watch

Situation at the Ukrainian border and in Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine (debate)

Mr President, what we are discussing today is not just one more instance of the aggressive behaviour of the Kremlin. It is possible that, in the future, this day will be shown as the day when the geopolitical future of the European Union in the 21st century started to be designed. Putin, who started the war against Georgia in 2008 and against Ukraine in 2014, is now demanding that those countries …

25

Nov

2021

EN Speech

Watch

Human rights violations by private military and security companies, particularly the Wagner Group

Madam President, first of all, we are discussing a very important issue, and second, we give our full support to this important resolution, and thank the initiators very much. Everybody knows what the Kremlin’s Wagner Group is and what kinds of war crimes they have committed in Crimea, Donbas, Syria, Libya, the Central African Republic and other places: torture, killings, sexual violence, mass sum…

23

Nov

2021

EN Speech

Watch

Situation in Belarus and at its border with the EU and the security and humanitarian consequences (debate)

Madam President, I am from Lithuania, that is why I am really grateful to the Commission. And I will not speak about Lukashenko today, but I will emphasis that, in this House, it’s quite popular to say that defence of the EU’s borders is in some way against the human rights of migrants. It’s wrong. Yes, we need to take care about the humanitarian crisis of those migrants who became hostages of the…

10

Nov

2021

EN Speech

Watch

The escalating humanitarian crisis on the EU-Belarusian border, in particular in Poland (debate)

Mr President, I am from Lithuania. For me, it is very clear: Lukashenko and Putin have a strategic goal to escalate situation on EU border. Let’s be ready. What do we need to do? The biggest mistake of Europe would be not to defend its own borders. That is why I would like to praise the daily job of our border guards. First of all, EU needs to answer to Lukashenko’s hybrid warfare with clear suppo…

20

Oct

2021

EN Speech

Watch

Pushbacks at the EU's external border (debate)

Madam President, dear Commissioner, dear colleagues, when we are talking about push-backs on the borders with Belarus, we need not to forget about the illegitimate Lukashenko regime and his crimes. He is the reason for the suffering which people of Belarus and millions on the borders are living through. Let’s push back Lukashenko out of power and there will be no more sufferings of ordinary people…

19

Oct

2021

EN Speech

Watch

EU-Taiwan political relations and cooperation (debate)

Mr President, since we are coming to the end of our discussions I will make a few conclusions and messages from our debate and from the report. The first one: There is strong cross-party support in this House for this unique report, which means that everybody is for more intensive relations between the EU and Taiwan. This is a message not only to China but also to EU institutions: Taiwan is no les…

5

Oct

2021

EN Speech

Watch

The situation in Belarus after one year of protests and their violent repression (debate)

Mr President, Madam Commissioner, dear colleagues, all of us we know what crimes against Belarusian people Lukashenko is committing, for what international crimes he is responsible. There is no need to repeat all the list. I would like to use this opportunity to thank Commissioner for your support for the Lithuanian authorities in defence of EU borders. But the only way out from this crisis is new…

14

Sep

2021

EN Speech

Watch

A new EU-China strategy (debate)

Madam President, first of all I would like to thank the rapporteur for a really good report. I will try to spend my minutes on some comments on Chinese policy towards EU Member States – this means Lithuania. The government of my country, Lithuania, in the spring decided to leave the so—called 17+1 format, which China created for relations with Central Europe in order to split the EU. Also, our gov…

14

Sep

2021

EN Speech

Watch

Direction of EU-Russia political relations (debate)

– Mr President, this report on the European Parliament recommendations on the direction of EU-Russia political relations is a report on a really important topic. Russia is an important country which has a big influence on all the developments in the Eastern part of the European continent and the EU needs to have a clear long-term strategy with clear goals and clear instruments for our policy towar…

7

Jul

2021

EN Speech

Watch

Conclusions of the European Council meeting of 24-25 June 2021 (debate)

Madam President, a few words about the Council’s conclusions on Russia. I can really congratulate Council with ‘No’ to proposals on having immediate EU-Putin Summit, but the Council perhaps spent too much time on discussions ‘to meet or not to meet’ Putin, and here were too little discussions on the long-term strategy how ‘to push back’ Putin on democracy, on Navalny, on Ukraine and on Belarus. An…

6

Jul

2021

EN Speech

Watch

EU global human rights sanctions regime (EU Magnitsky Act) (debate)

Madam President, really it is an opportunity to praise the EU Institutions, the Commission and Council and the EEAS on a successful initiative to introduce the Magnitsky Act in the European Union. I will try to make some very practical remarks about our steps forward. First of all, the preventive effect of Magnitsky sanctions should be strengthened: the same type of crimes should lead to the autom…