The European Union is planning new sanctions against Alexander Lukashenko’s regime in response to hybrid attacks on Lithuania. These include incidents involving balloons threatening airspace.
The European Union is preparing sanctions against the government of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko in response to “hybrid attacks” against Lithuania, the President of the European Commission (EC) Ursula von der Leyen announced on Monday. TASR informs about it based on the reports of the AFP agency and The Guardian newspaper.
The reason is mainly incidents with balloons in the airspace of Lithuania, which, according to the local authorities, are sent across the border by Belarusian cigarette smugglers. “The situation on the border with Belarus is worsening… Such a hybrid attack by the Lukashenko regime is absolutely unacceptable. Lithuania continues to have our full solidarity. We are preparing further measures as part of our sanctions regime,” said von der Leyen after a phone call with Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauséd.
Lithuania accuses the Belarusian president of deliberately not taking action against smugglers. Due to the balloons in the airspace, the Vilnius airport had to temporarily suspend its operations even on Sunday; this has happened at least ten times since the beginning of October.
In response to the incidents, Lithuania closed both border crossings with Belarus in October. She recently opened them again. Lukashenko described the border closure as part of an alleged hybrid war waged against Minsk. Belarus also accused Lithuania on Monday of using a drone for espionage and dropping “extremist materials” on Belarusian territory. Vilnius denies the allegations.
