Energy was the main issue on the agenda of the St. Petersburg meeting. Afterwards, Butkevičius, with his usual childish glee, boasted that Medvedev perfectly understood our choices regarding the EU's Third Energy Package: “No demands have been made that Lithuania change its position.”
Fair enough – Moscow was not as plainspoken this time. But what difference does it make? Medvedev gave Butkevičius a cool reminder that Lithuania chose the most stringent path of energy reforms – even compared to Poland and Germany.
This reminder is a giveaway of Russia's true attitude towards its relations with Lithuania. Moscow's goal – to make Lithuania succumb totally and unconditionally to its dictates – has not changed ever since Putin came to power.
Three years ago, when Lithuania's then Prime Minister Kubilius met with Prime Minister Putin, the main issue was energy, too. But despite the suggestion uttered by Kubilius back then, to talk to Gazprom about a possible review of pricing, Lithuania is still paying the highest price for gas in Europe.
Everyone in Lithuania should have realised by now that good rapport between Lithuania and Russia depends entirely on whether or not Russia wants one.
In February of the same year, 2010, Grybauskaitė met Putin in Finland and talked about the possibility for Lithuania to pay the same price for gas as Western European countries. The President's office had so many rosy dreams before that meeting that it must be embarrassing to even mention them now.
Then, just like now, Putin showered Grybauskaitė with compliments, saying that once she came to power, all obstacles to “normal relations” would be removed – and yet we still pay more for gas than Latvians, Estonians, Poles, or Germans. And we will continue to. Unless we build a liquefied natural gas terminal and drill into our shale gas reserves.
Another thing that the St. Petersburg meeting has confirmed is that Butkevičius has a sickly addiction to task groups. The Lithuanian Government has delegated all its work to task groups – even the Russian prime minister was advised to resume intergovernmental task groups of energy and economy specialists.
In fact, the afore-mentioned Lithuanian-Russian task groups have not held a meeting since 2011. But even if they did, could that possibly change anything? Bearing in mind that Russia is entirely run by Putin's own gang – and all decisions are made within its small circle – it would be little more than an imitation of intergovernmental relations.
In general, everyone in Lithuania should have realised by now that good rapport between Lithuania and Russia depends entirely on whether or not Russia wants one.
Lithuanian politicians' and diplomats' task is to be able to communicate this fact – convincingly and without silly told-you-so's as the conservatives are prone while in the opposition (but not while in the government!) – not only to Lithuania's EU and NATO allies but to the nation as well.
But our politicians never learn. Time and again, someone comes along with populist proclamations that Lithuania's relations with Russia depend on who is and what does the Lithuanian president and on which party runs the country.
When Grybauskaitė was running for president, she positively mocked [previous president] Adamkus' Eastern Partnership policies aimed at supporting democracy in Ukraine, Georgia, and other countries to the East. And what have we got now?
The Eastern Partnership policies are dead. Friendship with the US – because of the imaginary CIA prisons that Grybauskaitė and the conservatives searched for with such passion – has cooled down. But has all this moved Lithuanian-Russian relations an inch?
As long as Russia has no need for good relations with Lithuania, as long as the Kremlin seeks revenge for the collapse of the Soviet empire, we will not have a friendly rapport with Moscow.
Grybauskaitė has already burnt in the fire of Kremlin illusions. Butkevičius is flying towards the same flame like a silly butterfly. What did we get from St. Petersburg illusions?
Another Russian slap on the face. Regnum.ru, a news portal with ties to the Kremlin, did not give a single line on the coverage of Butkevičius-Medvedev meeting by the Lithuanian media, even though previously, it had comprehensively reported on how Estonians and Latvians viewed Ansip's and Dombrovskis' rendezvous with Medvedev (it even noted that Medvedev forgave Estonia's Ansip, who spoke to him in Russian, for his remark about “drunkards and looters”).
Does it mean there is no point in holding meetings with Russia's prime ministers and government officials? On the contrary, it is necessary! One must talk with all neighbours and all the time. But one should not delude oneself into believing what is not the case. And one should definitely not brown-nose. Like our economy minister Vėsaitė does.
When asked about the impression that Medvedev gave him, the Lithuanian Prime Minister said that he came across as “a friendly statesman, a cultivated and intelligent person.”
A prime minister has no right to speak any differently. But the reality is closer to what Russian journalist Masha Gessen wrote in her book “The Man Without A Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin”: “Compared to Medvedev, even Putin came across as a charismatic man. Next to Medvedev, a man a little taller than 150 centimetres (his exact height is a carefully-guarded secret), Putin even looked tall; he even imitated Putin's way of emphasizing words, but if every syllable coming from Putin's mouth sounded ominous, in Medvedev they sounded like voice synthesizer.”
Medvedev is little more than Putin's puppet. And one that is now in Putin's disfavour. Only because, during his four years as the president, he made two and a half feeble attempts to give a human face to the regime built on fear, threats, and political murders.
So let us be realists. A reset in relations with Russia is a very distant prospect. And that only if we are lucky.
