Russia’s acting chargé d'affaires in Lithuania Sergey Ryabokon said on Thursday that he had handed a note to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Vilnius, because, according to him, Lithuania leaves no way to pay for Kaliningrad transit services.
The diplomat has told the state-run Rossiya 24 TV station that operators in Russia who use the services of Lithuanian Railways are obliged to pay for freight transport, while Vilnius only accepts payments through one bank, Šiaulių Bankas, which is suspending transactions with Russia from September.
“When I visited the Lithuanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday, I raised this issue – I personally handed over a note on Šiaulių Bankas: please clarify, there is still time until September 1, after all you have solved the Kaliningrad transit issue, you have removed all tensions. [...] Then why are you preparing a second blow to cargo transit?” Ryabokon is quoted by the Russian news agency RIA.
He said the move is a new blow to transit to Kaliningrad via Lithuania, “only in another direction”.
Valerija Kiguolienė, a spokeswoman for the Association of Lithuanian Banks, told LRT.lt that a number of banks have already decided stop handling payments to and from Russia and Belarus, but exceptions can be made in certain cases.
“Financial institutions operate in the global financial system and constantly monitor current economic and geopolitical processes and closely cooperate with financial market regulators and other institutions, as well as responsibly comply with all applicable norms and sanctions regimes,” she said.
“Currently, a number of banks in the Association of Lithuanian Banks have taken the decision to phase out payments to and from Russia and Belarus. Payments to and from these countries related to humanitarian aid (eg, pensions, medical supplies) and essential needs of the state (eg, implementation of international agreements) are normally subject to individual exemptions,” she said in a comment sent to LRT.lt.
Šiaulių Bankas announced last week that from August 15 it would no longer handle payments in Russian roubles, regardless of the recipient’s country, and from September 1, it would stop making payments to or from Russia and Belarus in any currency.
At the same time, the website of Šiaulių Bankas states that “exceptions to the execution of payments may be applied by prior agreement in cases where payments are made for humanitarian purposes or to ensure the performance of state functions”.
The other major Lithuanian banks – Swedbank, SEB and Luminor – no longer handle payments between Lithuania and Russia and Belarus.
Russia resumed the Kaliningrad transit of sanctioned goods this week, about a month after Lithuania had suspended it, quoting EU sanctions on certain Russian goods. However, earlier this month the EC issued a clarification, saying sanctions will not apply to rail transportation of goods between Kaliningrad and mainland Russia.
Read more: Read more: Lithuania and Kaliningrad – updates
Newsletter
Every Friday morning.
