The head of the Kremlin’s Security Council has threatened the “Lithuanian population” with an escalation of the dispute over the refusal of the Lithuanian Railways to allow some goods to pass through the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.
After a meeting in the region, which is wedged between Lithuania and Poland, 800 miles from Moscow, Nikolai Patrushev stepped up his rhetoric, threatening “serious consequences.”
“Russia will certainly respond to such hostile actions,” Patrushev said. “Appropriate measures will be taken in the near future… Their consequences will have a serious negative impact on the Lithuanian population.”
Over the weekend, Lithuanian State Railways told Russian customers it could no longer transport steel or iron ore across the EU to Kaliningrad, on the Baltic Sea.
Goods banned from entering the EU under sanctions imposed after Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine include Russian coal, metals, building materials and modern technology. Only less than half of the goods that cross Lithuania on about 100 train journeys each month fall under EU sanctions, although there are different dates for their entry into force.
The oil ban will not take effect until December as part of a compromise between the 27 EU member states.
Activists protesting in front of the Lithuanian Embassy in Moscow on June 21 against the railway curbs in Kaliningrad display posters reading “Closing the border? Our army is visa-free “and” Lithuania is in line for democratization. ” Photo: Maxim Shipenkov / EPA
The railway message sparked panicky shopping in Kaliningrad and an angry reaction from Moscow, where officials accused Lithuania of violating transit agreements signed in 2004.
The European Commission has said Lithuania has acted legally, although EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said on Monday that he would “double check” on what appears to be an attempt to pull the sting out of the dispute.
Patrushev, one of Putin’s closest aides, spoke after a meeting in Kaliningrad, while earlier on Tuesday the Russian Foreign Ministry summoned EU Ambassador to Moscow Marcus Ederer over “anti-Russian restrictions.”
“The inadmissibility of such actions, which violate the relevant legal and political obligations of the European Union and lead to escalating tensions, was emphasized,” the ministry said in a statement.
Speaking shortly after the meeting, Ederer said he had called on the Russian government to “keep calm” and “resolve the issue diplomatically”, Russia’s Tass news agency reported.
Kaliningrad, home to the Russian fleet in the Baltic Sea, has a population of about 500,000. It was captured by Nazi Germany from the Red Army in April 1945 and handed over to the Soviet Union at the end of the war.
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