Lithuania has evacuation plans in face of Russia threats, PM says - BBC News
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Lithuania ready to 'fight back' but has evacuation plans in face of Russia threats, PM tells BBC
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Figure caption: ‘We will fight back’ if Russia attacks, Lithuanian PM says
By Tabby Wilson
Published 49 minutes ago
Lithuania's Prime Minister Mindaugas Sinkevičius has told the BBC his country has made evacuation plans in the face of threats from Russia, but added they "will not surrender" if attacked.
Prime Minister Mindaugas Sinkevičius told Newsnight that Lithuanians feel "constantly threatened" by Russia, partly due to drones entering their airspace. He stated:
"If [Russia] attacks us, we will fight back... we will engage."
However, he revealed there are plans for various scenarios, citing examples of smoothly evacuating elderly citizens from cities and avoiding traffic jams.
Lithuania, a NATO member, shares a land border with the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.
"We're thinking about a variety of scenarios, not all of them are being discussed very much publicly," Sinkevičius explained. "We face concrete threats... it's a true reality for us."
He also called for a shift in the UK's approach to defense, noting Lithuania is "closer to the border and closer to [the] threat". This comes after Nato fighter pilots shot down a drone that entered Lithuanian airspace last week.
Though the drone's origin remains unconfirmed, the Lithuanian Defense Minister Robertas Kaunas claimed it came from Belarus, Lithuania's neighbor and a key Russian ally. The UK's Defense Secretary Wes Streeting praised Nato's response.
"Thanks to the swift and professional actions of Lithuanian and Italian forces, NATO once again demonstrated our readiness to protect our airspace," he said.
Moscow has not commented on the incident.
Military drone incursions have become more frequent across Europe since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Residents in Lithuania's capital Vilnius were also forced to take shelter in May after a drone alert was triggered, briefly grounding flights and rail travel. Nato jets have scrambled multiple times to shoot down stray Ukrainian drones that have crossed into fellow Baltic countries Estonia and Latvia this year.
Ukraine has attributed these stray drones to Russian electronic warfare technology designed to alter the flight paths of Ukrainian drones.
Lithuania, Estonia, and Latvia all joined NATO in 2004, becoming signatories to Article 5, which states that an armed attack against one NATO member shall be considered an attack against all members.