Ruslan Stefanchuk, chairman of Ukraine’s Verkhovna Rada, was presented with an Aleksandras Stulginskis Star, an award established by the Lithuanian parliament, at a ceremony on Thursday.
Viktorija Čmilytė-Nielsen, speaker of the Lithuanian parliament, Seimas, stated during the award ceremony that Russian totalitarianism had to be abolished and hailed Ukraine for being at the forefront of this fight.
“Russian totalitarianism, an ideology of hatred similar to fascism or Nazism, is incompatible with the norms of civilised coexistence and international security, and must therefore be abolished,” she stressed.
Before the ceremony, the speaker invited MPs to observe a minute’s silence in honour of fallen Ukrainian children. On Thursday, the International Day for Protection of Children, three people, including a nine-year-old girl, were killed during an air strike on Kyiv.
Čmilytė-Nielsen also said that Lithuania vowed to support the Ukrainians for as long as necessary and to do its utmost to ensure that the support of the international community did not wane.
Speaking about Stefanchuk during the award ceremony, she described him as one of Ukraine’s most charismatic leaders, inspiring millions of his compatriots to stand up to imperial aggression through his personal leadership, courage and example.
“His efforts to mobilise the parliamentary community of the democratic world for the freedom of the homeland are exceptional,” Čmilytė-Nielsen stressed.
Paulius Saudargas, deputy speaker of the Seimas and a member of the Stulginskis Award Commission, praised Stefanchuk as one of the leaders inspiring Ukraine to fight, and said he was regarded by the international community as the cornerstone of Ukraine’s Euro-Atlantic integration.
“Since the first days of the war, we have seen the speaker of the Ukrainian parliament as one of the leaders of the state at the forefront of the fight for Ukraine's freedom. He is a politician who inspires Ukrainians to fight by his personal leadership, courage and example,” Saudargas said.
This year, the Aleksandras Stulginskis Star has been awarded to the chairman of Ukraine’s Verkhovna Rada and Česlovas Juršėnas, a former Lithuanian MP and a signatory to the March 11 Act of Independence, who was presented with the award on May 18.
The Aleksandras Stulginskis Star is awarded for contribution to promoting parliamentarianism, democracy and statehood. Previous awardees include former Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus and US Senator Richard Joseph Durbin.
Established by the Lithuanian parliament in 2020, the award is named after Aleksandras Stulginskis, a Lithuanian president between 1920–1926 and speaker of the Constituent Seimas.
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