Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on May 8, 2025
1 min readLast updated: January 24, 2026
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Lithuania's parliament has approved exiting the Ottawa Convention on landmines due to perceived threats from Russia, following Latvia's lead.
By Andrius Sytas
VILNIUS (Reuters) - The Lithuanian parliament on Thursday voted in favour of withdrawing from the Ottawa Convention that bans the use of anti-personnel landmines amid concerns over the military threat posed by neighbouring Russia.
All five European Union and NATO countries which border Russia – Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland and Finland - have said they plan to exit the international treaty due to the military threat from their much larger neighbour.
The Lithuanian vote follows the one in Latvia, where the parliament in April approved the withdrawal.
After withdrawing from the treaty, the countries would be able to stockpile and lay landmines six months after informing other treaty members and the United Nations of their decision.
None of the five countries have done so yet.
Russia is not a member of the Ottawa Convention and has used landmines in its invasion of Ukraine.
(Reporting by Andrius Sytas in Vilnius, editing by Louise Rasmussen and Terje Solsvik)
The main topic is Lithuania's decision to exit the Ottawa Convention on landmines due to military threats from Russia.
Lithuania is exiting the treaty due to concerns over military threats posed by Russia, following similar moves by other EU and NATO countries.
The Ottawa Convention is an international treaty that bans the use of anti-personnel landmines.
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