Lithuania’s Defence Minister Laurynas Kasčiūnas told Euronews that letting Ukraine into NATO is the only way to prevent Russian aggression, as Ukraine’s Western allies are hesitant about allowing the war-torn country in the alliance.
ADVERTISEMENT“NATO should extend an invitation for membership to Ukraine as part of guaranteeing its future security,” the Lithuanian Defence Minister Laurynas Kasčiūnas told Euronews.
Kasčiūnas also said “Russia needs to know that it can’t have a ‘veto’ over another country, or over the future size of NATO”.
“Lithuania always supported Ukraine’s invitation into the NATO, because in our understanding, you cannot send the message to Russia that they have at least informal veto power on NATO’s enlargement,” said the minister.
‘It’s the biggest mistake,” he added.
He was speaking after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy presented his Victory plan to EU counterparts and NATO allies, which includes an invitation for Ukraine to eventually join NATO.
However, while Lithuania may be among several countries who see a Ukrainian invite to membership as a morally just and tactically sound policy, there are other allies such as the US which may see it as a provocation to Russia.
In addition, other allies such as Hungary and Slovakia are actively against the proposal.
At the 75th anniversary of NATO Summit in Washington DC last July, Ukraine was told it was on an “irreversible bridge” towards membership but which fell short of a formal invitation.
However, Kasčiūnas said that an invitation to join is not the same as full membership as it will take several years for Ukraine to meet sufficient interoperability levels, and standards of the alliance. However, it would send the signal to Russia and Ukraine about the ‘irreversibility’ of Ukraine’s western direction, and independent sovereignty.
“Ukrainian nation, which fights for their independence but also fights for our security, deserves right to self-determination. An invitation is not membership, but it’s a point of no return. It’s irreversibility. So I think we can at least give them an invitation,” he said.
‘‘Just words about the irreversibility bridges, sorry.. is not working. We need actions”.
In addition, he argued the current impasse is counterproductive because Russia only reacts to strength.
Kasčiūnas reminded that Baltic countries, including his own, had long urged the EU and the West to take stronger action against Russia, but their warnings were ignored.
”We, Baltics, always said give more weapons to Ukraine for deterrence. If Ukraine is strong Russia will be deterred,” he explained.
“And we heard a lot of voices from our friends, telling us, look, if you will give the weapons to Ukraine, it will escalate. It will provoke. But we didn’t give enough, and now we see what’s happened”.
ADVERTISEMENT“Doing nothing is escalatory,” he told Euronews.