This is how she reacted to the Presidency’s explanation that the appointment procedure is stalled because the candidate proposed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) does not meet the qualifications – he does not speak Polish.
“As far as I know, proposals for an ambassador to Poland were coordinated so long ago that learning the Polish language would not have been a big problem for any qualified diplomat, at least enough to be able to work,” the Prime Minister told reporters in the Seimas on Thursday.
She said that she was familiar with the discussions of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Seimas Committee on Foreign Affairs and the Presidency during the coordination of candidacies, but she said that she had not heard any complaints regarding language skills.
According to I.Šimonytė, as far as she knows, there are no complaints regarding their competence when combining candidacies, since the candidates “are not political”.
“It’s just the way it is that the candidacies are coordinated, I would say, for an inexplicably long time and very often, from the initial presentation of the candidate to any decision, even the decision that the candidate is not suitable, quite a lot of time passes (…). In my understanding, it takes a lot of time to think regarding those questions and not answer whether those candidates are suitable or not. I don’t think this is good,” said the Prime Minister.
“Now, as always, it would be very important to have an ambassador in Poland, but hey, we’ll have to look for consensus until we find it,” she added.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Gabrielius Landsbergis stated on Thursday that the ministry submitted the first candidacies for the position of Lithuanian ambassador to Poland on time, almost a year and a half ago, but they got stuck in the Presidency.
In turn, the President’s representative Ridas Jasiulionis told BNS that the latest candidate submitted was rejected due to qualifications, that is, he did not speak Polish.
Lithuania’s ambassador to Poland Eduardas Borisovas has been removed from his position following the end of his term of office since September 7 of this year, the embassy is currently headed by Minister Plenipotentiary Audronė Markevičienė.
The question regarding the ambassador arises following the new government of Donald Tusk was sworn in in Poland, Vilnius hopes to improve relations with Warsaw and avoid past disagreements with the Government of D. Tusk and the then and current head of diplomacy Radoslaw Sikorski.
Ambassadors are appointed and dismissed by the President at the proposal of the Government and with the approval of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Seimas.
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2024-07-18 17:06:47
