Prime Minister meets European Commissioner Magnus Brunner: focus on EU internal security, migration, and border protection
Prime Minister Gintautas Paluckas has met with Magnus Brunner, European Commissioner responsible for internal affairs and migration to discuss European Union’s internal security, protection of critical infrastructure, migration management, and hybrid threats.
The conversation has placed particular emphasis on the measures Lithuania has implemented to combat illegal migration along its borders and the progress made in this respect. The Prime Minister has expressed support for the European Commission’s initiatives aimed at strengthening EU’s internal security.
‘Migration is not an issue that concerns only the EU’s border states — it is a shared challenge with far-reaching implications for the entire Union. We must acknowledge its broader impact and commit to finding collective solutions. Hostile actors are deliberately exploiting illegal migration, alongside other hybrid tactics, to destabilize Europe. This makes a common understanding of these threats and a coordinated European response more crucial than ever’, the Prime Minister said.
The Prime Minister has further stressed that Lithuania identifies hybrid threats as one of today’s principal security challenges. Therefore, it is crucial that every EU member state has the capacity to counter disinformation, respond to hostile provocations, recognize propaganda, and withstand other hybrid tactics.
The meeting has also highlighted the need for sufficient funding for the protection of critical infrastructure—particularly in the energy sector—within the EU’s Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) for 2028–2034, with special attention to Member States at the Union’s external borders. The Prime Minister has underscored the importance of maintaining the Kaliningrad transit scheme as a priority in the upcoming MFF, noting that its continued implementation will require additional resources.
With rising geopolitical tensions and the operations of Russia’s so-called “shadow fleet” in the Baltic Sea, concerns are mounting over the heightened risk to underwater infrastructure. The Prime Minister has warned that any incidents in the Baltic Sea could carry significant economic consequences, that is why the Lithuanian Government has already put in place a national response protocol to address potential breaches of maritime infrastructure.
