Lithuania Calls to Limit Russia and Belarus' Abuse of Interpol
Lithuanian Interior Minister Agne Bilotaite has called for restricting the ability of Russia and Belarus to achieve their political goals through Interpol and said that Interpol cannot be a political tool in the hands of hostile regimes. This was reported by the Ministry of the Interior of Lithuania.
Bilotaite made the statement at the 91st General Assembly of Interpol, which is taking place on 29-30 November in Vienna.
"The international community cannot tolerate the misuse of the Interpol channel, the persecution of citizens of both its own and other countries for political purposes," Bilotaite said.
"Russia has initiated criminal proceedings against several Lithuanian judges and taken steps to put them on the international wanted list. These actions are related to the '13 January' case and the 1991 events in Lithuania, when 14 civilians were killed and more than 800 injured in the nation's struggle for independence," she added.
In November, Lithuania sent a letter to the interior ministers of the European Union and associated Schengen countries regarding the draft resolutions submitted by Russia and Belarus.
According to the minister, Russia's proposal clearly contradicts the resolution proposed by Ukraine and adopted at the general assembly last year. In addition, Moscow completely ignores the discussions in the working group on the possibility of suspending the membership of states that violate Interpol's rules.
According to Bilotaitė, the Belarusian proposal is aimed at publishing unverified Interpol reports on international wanted persons and, as Lithuania says, will allow "using bilateral relations to act on unverified reports".
"We note that Russia and Belarus are always looking for ways to impose their political will. This General Assembly is no exception, and this is well illustrated by the draft resolutions proposed by these countries. We must ensure that such proposals are not adopted," she said.
INTERPOL, the international criminal police organisation, promotes police cooperation on a global scale. After Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Interpol announced that it would limit its cooperation with Moscow.
In the summer of 2023, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, General Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, told the Washington Post in an interview that in 2019, during a visit to the NATO summit in Brussels, he was detained by Interpol officers. This happened after the Kremlin put him on the wanted list in absentia as a "war criminal".