Lithuania to get EU funding to secure its border with Russia

Lithuania will receive European Commission funding to secure its border with Russia.

As reported by LRT, Lithuania’s Interior Minister Agnė Bilotaitė sent a letter asking for financial support to the European Union Commissioner for Home Affairs Ylva Johansson in early July. In the letter, she stressed the urgent need to upgrade border surveillance systems.

"We will receive funding from Europe. There’s now €150 million earmarked specifically for strengthening the infrastructure of the eastern borders. Of course, we will have to share these funds, but I think that this is probably not the end of the story," Bilotaitė told the Žinių Radijas radio.

Lithuania is estimated to need an additional €65 million for the upgrade of its border surveillance systems by 2030, LRT reported.

"We don’t see any migrant flows there, but we clearly understand that we need to strengthen the border. I have tasked our border service to draw up a plan of measures and priorities to strengthen our border with the Russian Federation, meaning that we need to upgrade certain infrastructure," Bilotaitė said.

Lithuania’s only 275-kilometre border with Russia runs along the Kaliningrad exclave on the Baltic coast.

To date, the European Commission has provided Lithuania with around €100 million to strengthen its border with Belarus.

Following a meeting in Riga, Latvia, on 18-19 January, the Latvian, Estonian and Lithuanian defence ministers have agreed to create a joint defence zone on the eastern border where their countries border Russia and Belarus.

In late June, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said that Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia called on the EU to build a defence line along the border with Russia and Belarus.