Mitkus urges EU to fund defence and eastern border resilience

Lithuanian Deputy Foreign Minister Sigitas Mitkus urged the European Union to provide adequate funding for defence and resilience in its eastern border regions at a General Affairs Council meeting in Luxembourg on Tuesday, LRT reported.

Mitkus said the bloc’s next long-term budget should reflect security challenges and support defence, strategic infrastructure such as Rail Baltica, and resilience in eastern border regions. He said these priorities should not be funded by weakening cohesion or agricultural policy.

Lithuania welcomed efforts by Ireland, which holds the EU Council presidency, to speed up budget talks with an updated negotiating package. The package protects cohesion policy, the common agricultural policy and home affairs funding from cuts, according to the Foreign Ministry.

However, Lithuania said the proposed negotiating direction raised concerns about reduced funding for strategic programmes, including defence, military mobility and the Connecting Europe Facility. It also stressed that the European Commission’s proposed budget should remain ambitious, saying calls to cut it by hundreds of billions of euros would not help secure an agreement.

The council also continued preparations for the European Council meeting on October 15 and 16 and discussed simplifying EU legislation, resilience of democracy and readiness for EU enlargement.

In preparation for the summit, Lithuania highlighted the need to maintain comprehensive support for Ukraine, strengthen Europe’s defence readiness and increase pressure on Russia. It also called for continued support for Ukraine’s EU integration and for that process to be accelerated while maintaining clear requirements and effective safeguards.

Ministers also reviewed progress on the EU’s 2026 legislative priorities and the rule of law situation in Hungary.