Kalingrad is the home port for Russia’s Baltic Sea Fleet
Max Sneddon in Riga and Richard Milne in Oslo – FT.com June 21, 2022
Russia has threatened Lithuania with serious consequences if the Baltic country prevents it from exporting EU-sanctioned goods to the exclave of Kaliningrad by rail.
Nikolai Patrushev, Russia’s security council secretary and one of President Vladimir Putin’s closest confidants, said during a trip to Kaliningrad on Tuesday that Russia would “react to such hostile actions” after Lithuania began enforcing the sanctions.
Patrushev warned that “appropriate measures” would be “taken in the near future”, adding that “their consequences will have serious negative influence on the population of Lithuania”, according to the Interfax news agency.
Russia accused the EU of starting a “blockade” of Kaliningrad after Lithuania, which controls the only overland rail route linking the exclave to mainland Russia via Belarus, began restricting the transit of goods under EU sanctions over Russia’s war in Ukraine.
These include iron and steel, luxury goods and some other products banned in earlier sanctions packages, which amount to a quarter of total Russian rail supplies to Kaliningrad.
Lithuanian policymakers have repeatedly stated that they are implementing EU sanctions and not imposing any unilateral measures on Russia. “There is no blockade of Kaliningrad,” said Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė.
Lithuania says passenger travel and the transit of non-sanctioned goods remain unaffected.
Brussels has given its full backing to Lithuania over the trade ban and said it had provided guidance to Vilnius regarding how to apply EU sanctions.
“Lithuania is basically doing what it is supposed to do under the sanctions regime,” said Eric Mamer, spokesman for the European Commission.
Moscow’s threats are among the most serious it has made to a Nato member since Putin ordered the invasion of Ukraine in February.
The war has alarmed officials in the Baltic state who are worried about blowback from neighbouring Belarus — which is letting Russia use its territory as a staging post to attack Ukraine — and the possible risk of direct Russian military intervention.
Russia’s Kalingrad exclave is surrounded by NATO countries. Click to enlarge
Kaliningrad is home to Russia’s Baltic fleet and nuclear-capable Iskander ballistic missiles. Russia has threatened to change the region’s “non-nuclear” status in the past but has not said whether the weapons carry nuclear warheads.
Lithuanian officials have long worried about Russia’s potential ability to cut off the Baltics from the rest of Europe by exploiting the short border between Kaliningrad and Belarus, known as the Suwalki Gap.
A Baltic security official said Russia’s recent military exercise included practising closing the Suwalki Gap and invading Lithuania.
Margiris Abukevičius, Lithuania’s deputy defence minister, told the Financial Times earlier this year that Russia’s dominance over Belarus in military matters, combined with Kaliningrad, created new strategic challenges for Nato.
Referring to a potential closure of the Suwalki Gap, he added: “It’s a complex issue that would very seriously affect the ability of [Nato] allies in a crisis situation.”
Unlike Estonia and Latvia, Lithuania does not have a large population of Russian speakers that Moscow could try to exploit, but officials in Vilnius are well aware of the dangers of being so close to Kaliningrad.
Anton Alikhanov, the province’s governor, has said that Kaliningrad would ship in the sanctioned goods from the mainland over the Baltic, but warned that the increased cost would make the deliveries economically unviable.
EU sanctions bar Russian planes from the bloc’s airspace, forcing flights to make a lengthy detour around the Baltic states to reach mainland Russia.
Moscow has not said what it would do to Lithuania if the shipments did not resume.
Russia’s foreign ministry summoned Markus Ederer, the EU’s ambassador to Moscow, on Tuesday to demand “the immediate resumption of the normal function of transit to Kaliningrad” and threatened an unspecified “response” if this did not happen, it said in a statement.
But Lithuania’s defence minister, Arvydas Anušauskas, said there was a clear difference between the threatening nature of Russia’s rhetoric and its likely response.
“In this case, I think all this intimidation is more about propaganda and disinformation,” he said.
After the war this exclave should be divided up between Poland and Lithuania, to whom it rightly belongs.
Who’s calling the shots for Lithuania, U.S., NATO, EU ? I wonder if Lithuania is having second thoughts about joining NATO.
I was going to suggest a Spunk test, to see if this region was actually,
Prussian, Russian, Lithuanian or Polish.
Best not, !
If they do the same from Bradford/Keighley across to Blackburn/Bolton, It might be a case of the Pennines & the Rossendale ‘enclave’ is actually Paki !
Oh dear. What a mess.
@Hank
Q. “Who’s calling the shots for Lithuania, U.S., NATO, EU ?”
A. ZOGUK, ZOGUK, ZOGUK & ZOGUK
Hope that helps.
Q. Who’s calling the shots for ZOGUK?
A. The Synagogue Of Satan
Landberis:
‘After the war this exclave should be divided up between Poland and Lithuania, to whom it rightly belongs.’
No way. This exclave was, before it became an exclave, the Coronation City of the Prussian Kings. The Prussians were the last legitimate owners of it. Of course, its real name is Königsberg. Russia has no moral right of ownership there. You see, it was seized from Prussia after WWII, and Stalin brutally expelled the Prussian popualtion. That was a very dirty deed; ipso facto, no moral right can accrues to it. So it does not belong rightfully even to Russia , unless ‘victor-booty’ constitutes a moral right of ownership.
Yet you say that that Kaliningrad belongs to Poland and Lithuania ‘rightfully’! That is funny, really funny, since these semi-failed states that cannot even support their own popilations have exactly no ground on which they might claim it: nix, zilch, nada.
Putin should get together with Scholtz to work out a Russian-German reconciliation plan on a Kaliningrad/Königsberg basis. Now, that would be a truly creative act in contemporary international relations.
Sanctions are war by another means. “F–K the the EU” is what Victoria Nuland said, maybe Russia should adopt the same attitude!
How come this is not part of Russia anyway, did they not liberate it from the the “Third Reich”. Were they persuaded to give it away during the Yalta talks after the war?
@ SOPHIE JOHNSON
there is only the right of the
most powerful like germany
is under US admiralty law !
I think only some stupid deutsche
would like Königsberg back (a new
quarrel aple? no thank you!) . for
what ? for an afro/islamic mongrelized
f..ckland germany will be ?
When is the war of words going to end?
Remember that Poland was used by the west as a tool to start WW2 then left in the cold to face Germany and Russia after France and England promised to support them. Some support. They had what they wanted…..WW2. Will the same happen to Lithuania with WW3? I think so.
Washington says it supports Lithuania’s [illegal] blockade of Kaliningrad and as a member of NATO it will come to its aid as obliged to under NATO rules if it is attacked by Russia.
https://alethonews.com/2022/06/22/washington-supports-blockade-of-russian-exclave-by-nato-member-lithuania/
A fine comment from Sophie Johnson.
An internationally-binding law, agreed upon by the Allied Occupation Authorities, in 1947 and to which Britain is a signatory, abolished Prussia in perpetuity. Abolished! Can you imagine the arrogance involved, in legally abolishing an entire European regional identity and tradition? The nullification of Prussia was a great crime.
Even in its adjectival form, it has pretty much disappeared completely now. There are no Prussian regiments any more; no Prussian traditional dress, no Prussian orchestras, no Prussian engineering, no Prussian anything of anything.
Prussia is a historical redundancy. This was achieved by a diabolic alliance, bent on revenge, dispensing law by ungodly, hateful edict.
If Kalinigrad is attacked, conventional Russian missiles could destroy Polands infrastructure in an hour. Simply destroying every power station would put the country back two centuries. Then the riots would begin.
Great comments from andyay and Sophie Johnson.
Let us also not forget that the so-called constitution, forced on ‘West’ Germany in 1949 has no legal basis either. Only the German Reich can change and alter the Weimar Constitution which was the legal constitution of both the Weimar Republic and National Socialist Germany.
Hence, any law, any treaty agreement any ceding of territory, any ‘abolition’ done by this illegal, treasonable, American puppet government is null and void and should be considered so by the German people.
Russia since the breakup of the USSR has held that the train and contents are ‘Sovereign Russian Territory’ sort of Diplomatic immunity.
“The simplified transit mechanism started operating on July 1, 2003, less than a year before Lithuania joined the EU on May 1, 2004. Military transit, meanwhile, followed the so-called German rules that were used during the withdrawal of Russian military forces from Berlin.
“This means that Lithuania regulates the rules of the transit without breaching its sovereignty,” said Lopata, and has the right to demand to know the nature of the transit, dates, sizes, and other details.
The agreement is renewed on a yearly basis. Civilians can also get transit visas onboard the trains under a simplified procedure.”
You can bet that hidden somewhere in the Break-up agreements this is stored away.
Russia always has legal justification in it’s actions. Probably Lithuania reverts to Russia if the agreement is breached.
Good luck with being stupid and prodding the Bear.
@ MACHINEWRECHER
the DEUTSCHES REICH is the only
heir of lost war to the treasonus alliied
forces . but there is no representant if
we forget our today traitors Bundestags
bullshit . who could represent ? i think
foremost the elder of the House Hohenzollern
(though i am no friend of them) : but are they
making advances to UNO with advocates ?
as i know NOT ! this hohenzollern offspring
has only interests to get some stuff back the
state took from them . they are all TRAITORS
TO THE GERMAN RACE !
@ ANDYAY
i would not be proud of prussian culture+
tradition ! it was a tradition of oppressing
the people + to lure them into greatpower
megalomismo . same as the poor british
classes had to pay the price for doubtful
empire greatness . prussia was a symbol
of kadaver obedience drilled into the
mind of people to form them to robots ,
same what today jews+china want do much
more sofisticated . this kadaver obedience
existed for centuries + also made possible
german aristocrates could sell poor germans
to england to fight against american freedom
fighters . they did not come of free will, they
were slaves of the german aristocrates .
Johann Gottfried Seume was one of them .
look into wikipedia . germans were free tribes
before 500 years until they were kripeled in
mind by christian bullshit, priests, bishops,
nobility + kings (all parasites!)
Well, yes, antivax but you have to admit that Prussian men were world leaders, when it came to moustache grooming and upper-lip wax-stylings.
Whenever I picture a Prussian, I think of Heinz Guderian. It’s a little disconcerting to consider that Germany’s greatest general during World War II, was born in Kulm, in Poland. Although, of course, it was West Prussia then.
May be its time for another meteorite to wipe
out the human race and give a alternate life form a chance to enjoy this beautiful planet.
It’s obvious the present human species don’t
appreciate or realize what a fortunate fluke of nature our existence was attributed to.
“We live amongst fools.”