Linas LINKEVIČIUS

 Linas Linkevičius is a Lithuanian politician of the Social Democratic Labour Party. Linkevičius served as Minister of National Defence from 1993 to 1996 and from 2000 to 2004. He was the Lithuanian Permanent Representative to NATO from 2005 until 2011.

In December 2012 Linkevičius was appointed as Minister of Foreign Affairs. Linkevičius has been a constant opponent within the European Union and NATO of compromises with Russia over Ukraine.

In a newspaper column, in June 2015, Linkevičius warned Lithuania's NATO partners against regression to a mid-Cold War-like détente with Russia, as the one experienced in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s.

Referring to Lithuania as a "frontline state" with Russia, he urged in that column that "NATO’s capabilities should be based on sober threat analyses, not illusions. Anything that the Kremlin perceives as weakness will encourage it to press ahead."