Lithuanian Foreign Minister Ridicules Belarus' Request To Extradite Tikhanovskaya

Hell will freeze sooner than Vilnius considers Minsk's demands, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said on Friday in response to the Belarusian government's extradition request for opposition activist and ex-presidential candidate Svetlana Tikhanovskaya

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 05th March, 2021) Hell will freeze sooner than Vilnius considers Minsk's demands, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said on Friday in response to the Belarusian government's extradition request for opposition activist and ex-presidential candidate Svetlana Tikhanovskaya.

Earlier in the day, the Belarusian Prosecutor General's Office said it had submitted an official request to Lithuania to extradite Tikhanovskaya for further prosecution on criminal charges for crimes against the state and public safety.

"Lithuania has been and will be a wall behind which all the democratic forces that are persecuted by regimes can seek refuge. Therefore, everyone who finds refuge in Lithuania can feel safe that they will not be extradited to regimes - neither for their struggle for democracy, nor freedom of expression and religious views.

Thus, we can tell the Belarusian regime that we would rather watch hell freeze over than consider its demands," Landsbergis said in a statement.

On Wednesday, the Lithuanian Foreign Ministry told Sputnik that it never expels people subjected to political persecution. The comment was in response to Belarus' declaring its intention to request Tsikhanovskaya's extradition.

Tsikhanovskaya left Belarus for Lithuania last August amid the initial, violent phase of post-electoral protests. The Belarusian opposition considered her the victor of the vote, while incumbent President Alexander Lukashenko claimed his own landslide victory.

Lithuania and Belarus have a bilateral agreement on legal cooperation, signed in October 1992, which covers civil, family and criminal cases.