"Lithuania places high value on the relationship with the United Kingdom. I am very happy to see the substantial growth of our bilateral defence cooperation over the past two years. We are also really grateful for the augmentation the United Kingdom has provided for the NATO Baltic Air Policing Mission, you are invited to keep contributing," J.Olekas said at the meeting.
The British Ambassador underlined the United Kingdom was and would be focussing substantially on the region. The country is looking to increase defence spending with regard to the security situation in Europe, with a significant part of the increase going to the modernisation of the armed forces. All of that will amount to a big contribution to the security of the Alliance.
While addressing NATO assurance measures in our region Minister J.Olekas invited the United Kingdom to send rotational units to Lithuania.
Minister J.Olekas also thanked the Ambassador for the British officer assigned to the NATO Force Integration Unit Lithuania.
While discussing the UK-led Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF) the Minister invited the United Kingdom to consider arranging JEF exercises in our region.
Lithuania and six other countries endorsed the Protocol of Intent on establishing the Joint Expeditionary Force at the NATO Summit in Wales in September 2014. The document provides for setting up a response force operating according to NATO standards and capable of deploying within a particularly short time in any region in response to any type of security threats.
The United Kingdom is deploying 400 troops to Exercise Arcade Fusion in Lithuania and Latvia and another 100-150 troops to international Exercise Iron Sword 2015 in Lithuania this autumn.
Allied Rapid Reaction Corps (ARRC) will deploy its UK-based headquarters elements for Exercise Arcade Fusion.
The United Kingdom offered and sent its aircraft to augment the NATO Baltic Air Policing Mission conducted from Šiauliai in 2014. British fighter jets are also strengthening the current rotation of the mission based at Amari in Estonia.
