Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė said on Monday that it would make sense for MP Laurynas Kasčiūnas, who chairs the parliamentary Committee on National Security and Defence, to replace the outgoing defence minister.
Arvydas Anušauskas, the conservative defence minister, announced last week he was resigning after being urged to do so by the prime minister.
On Monday, Šimonytė confirmed that Kasčiūnas, the conservative MP with hawkish position on national security, is the likely successor.
“It would be a logical thing to do, and there have been such things in Lithuanian politics when MPs who worked in the government returned to the Seimas [parliament] and swapped their positions,” the prime minister told journalists after a meeting with President Gitans Nausėda.
“The chairman of the Committee [on National Security and Defence] is one of the most natural candidates to replace the minister, just as the minister is one of the most natural candidates to replace the chairman of the committee,” she added.
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The prime minister said she and the president discussed the candidates for the post of defence minister on Monday, and that one candidate should be formally presented later this week.
Šimonytė said on Saturday that Anušauskas was stepping down because she expected to do “more and faster” for the security of Lithuania during the remainder of the government’s term in office.
On Monday, the prime minister said she expects defence minister to be involved in persuading politicians to allocate more funding for defence, amid ongoing discussions on where to get the money.
“We will certainly do our best to persuade, but obviously we need to persuade,” said Šimonytė about the ongoing discussions about military funding.
She also said that Anušauskas was not active enough in the plans to introduce universal conscription, which, according to Šimonytė, will be a priority in the parliament’s spring session.
“The ministry’s activity in mobilising support for this decision is crucial, and I will say that I miss that activity,” the prime minister said.
President Nausėda, who met with Anušauskas on Saturday, said that Kasčiūnas is only one of the candidates to replace him and insisted that it will be important for him to ensure a smooth continuity of the work in the national defence system.
Kasčiūnas said that he would be ready to take up the new position and that his main task in the post would be to implement the principle of “total defence”.
The replacement of the defence minister comes amidst discussions in Lithuania on the need to increase defence funding, preparations to accept a German brigade for permanent deployment, the development of a division in the military, and the end of the term of the chief of defence, General Valdemaras Rupšys, this year.
Ministers in Lithuania are appointed and dismissed by the president on the nomination by the prime minister.
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