Together with Estonia’s Foreign Minister E. M. Liimets, Government Plenipotentiary for the Three Seas Initiative, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Poland Pawel Jablonski and Slovenia’s Minister of Public Administration Boštjan Koritnik, Chancellor Balčytytė, has taken part in the discussion on Building Trusted Connectivity Through the Three Seas Initiative and Globally aimed to address the ways ensuring that digital connectivity is developed on the basis of trust and transparency, and that the Three Seas Region (3SI) becomes a model for the development of connectivity infrastructure.
Chancellor of the Government Giedrė Balčytytė has noted that Lithuania remains fully committed to the goals and agreed principles of the Three Seas Initiative and that it is now a member of the 3SI Investment Fund. In the field of digitisation, Lithuania is among the top ten. It is often ahead of the EU average and not far from Estonia, which is often seen as the leader in the field.
Giedrė Balčytytė has shared her insights on the awaiting challenges in dealing with key enablers. Trusted connectivity has been discussed at this conference as critical connectivity infrastructure, which builds on the democratic values of openness, transparency, involvement of local communities, protection of human rights and privacy. It contrasts with infrastructure development funded by authoritarian regimes.
‘The idea of trusted connectivity requires physical and digital infrastructure, funded and developed in accordance with transparent principles of protection of democratic values and human rights. On the other hand, absence of required skills will prevent us from keeping up and using such infrastructure. It is therefore necessary to talk about skills as yet another element in the development of the infrastructure. I am convinced that when many components of physical infrastructure can be financed by the private sector, the public sector must become the flagship in building the mentioned capacity’, said Giedrė Balčytytė.
On the first day of the visit (Monday), the Government Chancellor met in Tallinn with Estonia’s Secretary of State Taimar Peterkop and Chief Information Officer of the Estonian Government, Deputy Secretary General for Digital Development Siim Sikkut to discuss developments in data management and analysis. Estonia, like Lithuania, is taking efforts to find the best solutions in using operational data to manage emergencies. Giedrė Balčytytė also brought up the issues of centralised crisis management, strategic planning, and open government decision-making. It was agreed about bilateral interinstitutional cooperation to solve the most pressing issues of today.