Russia offers Lithuania to open a treasury account to pay for transit
[ad_1]
The authorities of Kaliningrad are ready to pay for transit through the territory of Lithuania through an account opened with the treasury of the Baltic republic. This was announced on August 9 at a meeting in the Valdai Club by the Governor of the Kaliningrad Region Anton Alikhanov. “If they (Lithuania. – Vedomosti) cannot force Lithuanian banks to work with us, well, let them force themselves. Let’s open an account with the Lithuanian Treasury. Let Russian Railways open such an account, and we will pay payments to its treasury system in relation to Lithuanian Railways,” the governor explained his proposal.
According to Alikhanov, the authorities are now actively using maritime transport to solve problems with transit. At the beginning of the year, Kaliningrad had only two ferries at its disposal, now there are already eight such ships. To completely overcome the difficulties with transit, the regional authorities, according to the governor, need 22 vessels with a cargo turnover of 1-1.1 million tons per year each. At the same time, due to the cessation of automobile transit through Lithuania, the trade turnover between Russia and Kaliningrad fell by 500,000 tons per year, 400,000 of which accounted for deliveries to the region. At the same time, the European Commission clarified that transit by rail cannot be higher than the average figure for previous years, but due to the ban on road transit, goods previously transported by road cannot be included in this quota.
Despite the clarification of the European Commission, the Lithuanian government has come up with new machinations that could stop the transit. The government has obliged all operators who use the services of Lithuanian Railways to pay through a single bank – Siauliu bankas. At the same time, the bank itself ceases to do business with Russian counterparties from September 1. Thus, without payment for the activities of Lithuanian railway workers, transit can be stopped again. The Lithuanian leadership is confident that Russia should deal with this problem itself. On August 9, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the country, Gabrielius Landsbergis, stated: “Lithuania is not responsible in the calculations of the Russian Federation for transportation. Russia must find ways to pay.”
The Russian Foreign Ministry said they had prepared a response to a possible cessation of transit. As Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador-at-Large Alexei Isakov emphasized at the Valdai Club discussion, the response was “worked out in an interdepartmental format.” However, Isakov did not say what exactly this reaction would be and urged “not to delve into the specifics of what we could do.” In addition, the diplomat accused Vilnius of manipulation. According to him, the statements of the Lithuanian government that it cannot influence the decisions of banks do not correspond to reality: they have the ability to influence and persuasion in relation to banking structures.
The Lithuanian authorities are not interested in de-escalation around Kaliningrad, Alexander Nosovich, editor-in-chief of the analytical portal RuBaltic.Ru, is sure. He explains that Lithuania, as a subsidized EU state, needs to constantly attract pan-European attention. By generating various news stories like support for Taiwan or the Belarusian opposition, Vilnius converts this attention into help from Brussels. But now Lithuania’s anti-Russian attacks have gone too far, and in the long run it is fraught with provoking a military conflict between Russia and NATO. According to Nosovich, Vilnius either does not understand this, or is sure that Russia will not go for an armed escalation. To solve the problem, Moscow, as before, needs to pose the question point-blank. Lithuania and the EU need to be reminded that the blockade of Kaliningrad is a good casus belli. Only in this case, one can hope for a solution to the problems with transit, the expert concludes.
The EU is no longer fully in control of Lithuania, whose anti-Russian position is too destructive by European standards, says Aleksey Dzermant, director of the Northern Eurasia Center for the Study and Development of Continental Integration. Now the United States has a decisive influence on Vilnius, and the more Russophobic the Lithuanian leaders behave, the more support they receive from Washington. Moscow can diplomatically influence the European Union and Germany so that they feel the possible consequences of the escalation and force Lithuania to pursue a more balanced policy, Dzermant said.
[ad_2]
Source link