Lithuania not considering renaming Taiwanese office, Motuzas says
Monday 7th September 2026 on 10:30 in
Lithuania
Lithuania is not currently considering changing the name of the Taiwanese Representative Office in Vilnius, Remigijus Motuzas, chairman of the Seimas Foreign Affairs Committee, told LRT radio on Monday.
“Lithuania is not considering this at the moment. I believe Taiwan itself should speak first. It should make the decision after assessing the background and circumstances,” Motuzas said when asked whether Lithuania was prepared to rename the office.
Discussions about changing the office’s name began at the start of the year. Then-Prime Minister Inga Ruginienė said she saw no reason why it could not be renamed the Taipei Representative Office and criticised the decision to open the office in Vilnius.
President Gitanas Nausėda said discussions about a name change were possible but warned that a negative response was also possible. Seimas Speaker Juozas Olekas said Lithuania should not rush to rename the office, arguing that such a move would probably not produce tangible results.
During the debate, a spokesperson for Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Taiwan had not discussed a possible renaming of the office with Lithuania.
The Taiwanese Representative Office opened in Lithuania at the end of 2021, significantly worsening relations between Vilnius and Beijing. China imposed strict diplomatic and economic sanctions, and its Foreign Ministry downgraded diplomatic relations with Lithuania from ambassadorial level to that of chargé d’affaires.
Beijing considers Taiwan a province of China and says it has no right to establish representative offices in countries that maintain official relations with China.
A draft of the current government programme calls for normalising Lithuania’s diplomatic relations with China to the level of representation currently maintained in other European Union member states. Prime Minister Mindaugas Sinkevičius said last week that he trusted Foreign Minister Kęstutis Budrys’s diplomatic abilities and hoped the goal could be achieved before Lithuania assumes the presidency of the EU Council.