Jankūnas and Vėgėlė leave door open to more China talks

Lithuanian MPs Rimas Jonas Jankūnas and Ignas Vėgėlė have described their meeting with Chinese representatives in Brussels as highly valuable and said similar visits may take place in the future, LRT reported.

“In my view, we may not be able to avoid more meetings of this kind in the future if the dialogue and contact promised by the Lithuanian Government in its programme do not take place,” Vėgėlė told a news conference at the Seimas on Thursday.

He said the politicians had been received at the highest level in the Belgian capital by Ambassador Zhai Jun. The Chinese delegation consisted of five people, including Fang Mei, a senior adviser for Lithuania.

Vėgėlė said the visit had the protocol status of an official bilateral political contact. He described the discussion as informative and respectful, and said it had produced messages and other information that could contribute to restoring bilateral relations, which he said Lithuania currently lacked. He also pointed to the two-hour meeting with the senior diplomat as evidence of the visit’s importance.

Politicians keep talks confidential

Jankūnas, who travelled to Brussels with Vėgėlė, said he was convinced that restoring relations with Vilnius was important to Beijing.

“We became convinced in Brussels that this issue matters to China. We did not represent either the Seimas or the Government, but we helped. We are trying to help the Government implement one of the critical foreign policy points in its programme,” Jankūnas said.

He said they would pass on the relevant information to Lithuania’s senior officials and hoped the Government’s programme would turn into action rather than remain words.

The politicians did not disclose what they had discussed with Chinese representatives. Vėgėlė said they believed diplomacy could be conducted quietly by passing information to the Lithuanian officials responsible for foreign policy and future decisions.

The two MPs belong to the Seimas temporary group For the normalisation of diplomatic relations with China to the level of European Union member states. They travelled to Brussels this week after the Seimas board refused to approve the trip. The politicians had proposed covering half of the costs from funds allocated for official travel and the other half from parliamentary funds, but ultimately paid for the visit themselves.

Conservative MP Radvilė Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė has asked the Seimas Commission on Ethics and Procedures to assess the visit.

The temporary group also includes Vitalijus Šeršniovas, Tadas Barauskas, Algirdas Butkevičius, Karolis Neimantas and Artūras Zuokas.

Relations between Vilnius and Beijing deteriorated sharply after Lithuania opened a Taiwanese Representative Office in late 2021. Beijing considers Taiwan a province of China and says it has no right to establish representative offices in countries with which China maintains official relations. China responded to Lithuania’s decision with strict diplomatic and economic sanctions.