Lithuania says it is not ready to send troops to Ukraine

Lithuania is not yet ready to discuss sending its military contingent to Ukraine. This was stated by Lithuanian presidential foreign policy adviser Asta Skaisgiritė on February 18 on the air of the local radio station Žinių.

"We could really help Ukraine with [military] instructors, without any doubt. But at the moment we are not talking about sending any military contingents,"Lithuanian National Radio and Televisionquoted her as saying.

Skaisgiritė added that European countries should first think about the safety of their soldiers before sending peacekeepers.

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Earlier in the day, Alexei Zhuravlev, first deputy chairman of the State Duma Defense Committee, told Izvestia that the militarily strongest EU countries fear their own collapse if peacekeepers are sent to Ukraine. The Baltic states, for their part, traditionally underestimate the risks of such a step, the lawmaker said.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova called the idea of sending peacekeepers a provocation back in late December last year. She also noted that it was impossible to talk about it, as the EU did not have the consent of all the parties to the conflict, as well as a positive decision of the UN Security Council.