Lately, in the “People You May Know” section, Facebook has been persistently suggesting that I add former Lithuanian Foreign Minister Linas Linkevičius as a friend. The reason, of course, is not that once I conducted two interviews with him, but that we have several mutual Facebook friends.

In the days leading up to the Russian-American negotiations, the former minister shared the following on his page:

“Our great friend Zbigniew Brzezinski once went hunting in Lithuania and shot two boars. He named one Molotov, the other Ribbentrop. When I tell this story, I always say that Molotov’s spirit is still alive and searching for his Ribbentrop. I hope he doesn’t find it.”

February marked the anniversary of the Karabakh Movement, and we once again shared materials from our Movement 1988/25 project with our readers.

In one of them, Ashot Manucharyan, a member of the Karabakh Committee, states:

“In reality, hell and heaven are inside a person and everyone lives in one of these inner realms. And we have made such a ‘focus’, as a result of which we have created a new quality of person. My ideological opponent Brzezinski, speaking about the problems facing America and the world, says that we must ‘create’ such a person. But we know how to ‘create,’ it is our know-how. The problem, however, is that we keep it a secret from ourselves, and we do not know how we managed to do it in 1988. If we manage to rediscover or ‘declassify’, it will be our greatest achievement.”

Let’s return to Linas Linkevičius. I first interviewed him in December 2014, following Armenia’s accession to the Eurasian Economic Union. During our conversation, he remarked: “All the members of the Eastern Partnership program are quite different, even those who are trying to be “in the ‘club’”

Our second interview took place in October 2018, during the signing of Armenia’s Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement (CEPA) with the European Union. At that time, he stated:

“In my view, priority should be visa-free regime, because for people it is important to see tangible results, not statistics or something else, to feel that they are free to travel. I know that from our own experience. When we opened borders, young students could travel and study, find jobs – it was a big deal, really, a revolution.”

Seven years have passed, and obtaining a Schengen visa has become significantly more difficult for Armenian citizens compared to 2018. Negotiations on a visa-free regime are still in their early stages and, according to the most optimistic forecasts, could take another two to three years. However, I have no reason to reproach Lithuania - or Linas Linkevičius in particular. From the very beginning, Lithuania has been a strong advocate for visa liberalization with Armenia, unlike some of the “older” EU member states.
Ara Tadevosyan is the Director of Mediamax.