The Lithuanian government decided on Wednesday to close the Lavoriškės and Raigardas border checkpoints on the border with Belarus as of March 1.
As a result, only two border checkpoints – at Medininkai and Šalčininkai – out of six will remain open on the Lithuanian-Belarusian border. Two checkpoints – at Šumskas and Tverečius – were closed last summer.
Ministers also backed the proposal to restrict the pick-up and drop-off of passengers at the Kena railway border checkpoint to tackle the problem of passengers on transit trains to Kaliningrad disembarking in Lithuania with documents issued by any EU member state for travel within the bloc.
Interior Minister Agnė Bilotaitė said earlier that some 13,000 people board or disembark trains at Kena every year.
Moreover, the government decided to suspend the movement of pedestrians and cyclists via the Medininkai and Šalčininkai checkpoints and to gradually reduce the number of permits issued to Belarusian and Lithuanian carriers operating regular international bus passenger services.
Lithuanian institutions say this is aimed at tackling problems of national security, smuggling, and violations of international sanctions.
Almost 3.9 million people crossing the Lithuanian-Belarusian border via road border checkpoints underwent checks last year, 25.5 percent more than in 2022, and Belarusian citizens accounted for 66 percent of them.
Lithuanian citizens crossed the border 684,000 times, 13.4 percent less than in 2022, while the number of unique travellers crossing the border last year amounted to almost 62,000, a drop of 17.5 percent.
The largest number of Lithuanian citizens crossed the border via the Šalčininkai and Lavoriškės checkpoints.
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