Radvilė Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė, Chair of the Seimas Committee on European Affairs, initiates a statement against intrumentalisation of migration in hybrid attacks

Press release, 1 December 2023

At the meeting of the Chairpersons and representatives of the European Affairs Committees in Madrid on 28 November 2023, Radvilė Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė initiated a statement by the Chairpersons of the European Affairs Committees of the national Parliaments of the European Union calling for a legal and practical solution to illegal smuggling of migrants as a form of hybrid aggression.

The Chair of the Seimas Committee presented the first version of the statement, which was endorsed by the Chairpersons of the European Affairs Committees of the Finnish, French, Italian, and Czech Parliaments. Other EU countries have also been invited to join the statement.

The Statement reads that the situation remains tense at the eastern external borders of the European Union. Over the past few years, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland have been confronted with hybrid warfare, namely the influx of irregular migration organised by Russia and the Belarusian regime supported by it. Finland has also been facing increased migratory pressure at the border with Russia recently.

Ms Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė believes that to ensure a lasting result, we must pay equal attention to combating migrant smuggling on all main illegal migratory routes.

‘The regimes of Putin and Lukashenko are pushing migrants to our borders. Flows of migrants are particularly intense at the Finnish-Russian border these days. A huge piece of legislation, the Migration and Asylum Pact, is currently being considered in the EU. We want to include new provisions on the new form of migrant smuggling instigated by Russia and Belarus recently. The Council of the EU has so far taken the position we have called for, but the negotiations with the European Parliament are not easy. That is why, together with our colleagues from other national Parliaments, we are appealing to the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission to draw attention to the instrumentalisation of migration (the use of migrants as a hybrid warfare tool),’ stressed the Member of the Seimas.

The Statement calls for support for decisive legal measures at European Union level to strengthen the security of the European Union and its Member States, to ensure the effective functioning of the Schengen area, and, with a view to ensuring comprehensive protection of human rights, to develop measures to counter disinformation campaigns targeting third-country nationals with the aim of engaging them in instrumentalisation in the field of migration.

The Statement will be forwarded to the European Parliament, the European Commission, the Council of the European Union, and the national Parliaments.

Radvilė Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė, Chair, Committee on European Affairs, Deputy Speaker of the Seimas of the Republic of Lithuania, tel. +370 688 27 850