Attempts are being made to recruit Belarusian nationals residing in Lithuania via social media, says Darius Jauniškis, director of the State Security Department (VSD). On Monday, the Lithuanian MPs proposed tightening restrictions on Belarusian citizens.
“We are now witnessing attempts to recruit people using modern means, ie via social media. Belarusian opposition representatives or business representatives who are here are being recruited and influenced by the Belarusian KGB and the Belarusian so-called GUBOPIK, which I mentioned,” Jauniškis said on LRT TV’s Dienos Tema (Topic of the Day) programme. “They are offered through social media to cooperate with the special services, to provide information about the opposition in Lithuania, and in some cases, sometimes even to pay for certain activities that they did in the past. We clearly see such activities.”
More than 60,000 Belarusians now live in Lithuania, he said. According to Jauniškis, intelligence services are struggling to check them all in order to make sure they do not pose security threats.
“If, say, 17,000 [Belarusians] enter each year, with work visas or temporary residence permits, you can do the math: we will have about 100,000 in 2025. That, I would say, is a significant force. There will obviously come a time, a red line when we will certainly not be able to cope because verification takes time, resources and effort. And there is no guarantee that we can look at everyone, check everyone, and, as you know, you can’t put an intelligence agent or a policeman on everyone,” opined the intelligence chief.
The VSD has drafted a report about the growing Belarusian expatriate community in Lithuania.
“Now it is up to the politicians and Lithuanian institutions to decide whether or not to level the playing field. It is our duty to warn about the threats. We see great potential for this,” Jauniškis said, adding that he would support entry restrictions for Belarusian nationals.
Jauniškis had said earlier that the operation of the Belarusian KGB “reached historical highs and has never been so active”, adding that security services have suspicions about some members of the Belarusian expat community in Lithuania.
“There is also a very large Belarusian diaspora in our country, people who come here and, in fact, raise certain counter-intelligence issues,” Jauniškis said.
Proposed restrictions
On Monday, a proposal to tighten restrictions on Belarusian citizens by putting them on par with the existing restrictions for Russian nationals, with an exception only for highly skilled Belarusians, was registered in the Lithuanian parliament Seimas.
“Our intelligence assessment has shown that there is an increased threat from the Belarusian special services, that migrants, who come to Lithuania to work and receive residence permits, are possibly being recruited, and that employees of the security structures also come to Lithuania to do their shady job. We need to protect ourselves and to control the inflow of these migrants as much as possible,” MP Paulius Saudargas, one of the lawmakers behind the new bill, told the BNS.
The amendments to the Law on Imposing Restrictive Measures Regarding the Military Aggression Against Ukraine foresee that the acceptance of applications for temporary residence permits by Belarusian citizens via an external service provider abroad would be stopped, as is currently the case for Russian nationals.
An exception would only apply to Belarusian citizens who intend to do highly skilled jobs included in the list of high value-added professions with a shortage of workers in Lithuania.
These amendments were registered by Laurynas Kasčiūnas, chair of the parliamentary Committee on National Security and Defence, representing the ruling conservative Homeland Union, and his fellow party members Saudargas and Audronius Ažubalis.
The MPs point out that the restrictions would only apply to the first temporary residence permits, ie to new arrivals. Meanwhile, old workers who have already received temporary residence permits in Lithuania would be able to extend them without any restrictions.
“Applications for temporary residence permits from both Russian and Belarusian citizens would not be accepted, with exceptions for cases when a government-authorised body mediates or when people already have Lithuanian or Schengen visas, or if they already have residence permits, or if they are going to do highly skilled jobs included in the list of high value-added professions,” Saudargas said.
The lawmakers also note that the restrictions do not apply to Russian and Belarusian citizens holding a visa from Lithuania or another Schengen state, as well as to people fleeing persecution and repression by regimes on humanitarian grounds, as well as to those who have obtained visas through the mediation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
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