Chairpersons of the foreign affairs committees of the Lithuanian, Latvian, Estonian, and Polish parliaments call on the Russian Duma to refrain from considering the initiative to justify the secret protocols of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact

Press release, 25 June 2020

Chairpersons of the foreign affairs committees of the Lithuanian, Latvian, Estonian, and Polish parliaments appealed to the State Duma and other authorities of the Russian Federation calling them on to base the relations with their neighbours on international law, the respect for their sovereignty and territorial integrity.

With a view to ensure good neighbourly relations, the first step would be to refrain from consideration of the draft law thereby proposing the State Duma to revoke the 1989 Resolution of the Congress of People’s Deputies of the Soviet Union condemning the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact. The adoption of the said draft law at the State Duma is scheduled for July 2020.

Juozas Bernatonis, Chair of the Seimas Committee on Foreign Affairs, said that ‘the joint appeal of the parliaments of the Baltic States and Poland sends a message that the countries, which were once occupied, stand united against any attempts to revise history and steps to justify the aggressive policy by the Russian Federation towards its neighbours’.

The joint appeal takes note that the draft law is an attempt to justify the international relations based on the use of violence against smaller neighbouring countries, which in fact affirms the current policy of the Russian Federation towards Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova, and opens the path for further potential violations of the international law.

Chairpersons of the foreign affairs committees of the Lithuanian, Latvian, Estonian, and Polish parliaments expressed hope that the State Duma of the Russian Federation will show no less wisdom and courage today than their predecessors did in 1989.

The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and its secret protocols signed in 1939 divided Central and Eastern Europe to the Soviet and Nazi spheres of influence. Soon after the signature of the Pact, World War II broke out, which left the Baltic States and Poland occupied. In 1989, the Congress of People’s Deputies of the USSR adopted a Resolution whereby the Soviet Union condemned the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and its secret protocols and declared them invalid as well as acknowledged its aggression towards third countries.

Eglė Maželė, Adviser, Office of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, tel.: +370 5 239 6835, e-mail: [email protected]