Lithuania’s Seimas Speaker hits out at Defence Minister

Lithuanian Seimas Speaker, Loreta Grauziniene, has hit out at National Defence Minister, Juozas Olekas, following the ministry’s handling of the search and rescue operation for the Antonov An-2 aircraft, which crashed in the Baltic Sea on May 17. 

As part of her attack on Olekas, Grauziniene said she would have “resigned already.”

“I have always said there must be political responsibility shown throughout the case, because the mistakes made in handling it were numerous,” said Grauziniene.

“In the past, both politicians and, for example, police commissioners, would assume their political responsibility. 

“They would also have nothing to do with those incidents but they fulfilled their responsibilities and demonstrated a level political maturity. 

“Now, it is very strange for Lithuanians to hear a politician say "as a minister I have nothing to do with this”.”

“This is not true, the minister is responsible,” she continued. “Because then what is the function of a minister if everybody else is doing their job. 

“This is what the ministry heads are for - to coordinate and ensure everything functions in the way it should.”

On June 2, 33 Lithuanian MPs signed an interpellation of against Olekas. 

The search and rescue operation for the An-2 was called off by the Lithuanian Ministry of Defence around May 21 2015.