At a breakfast lecture entitled "Lithuania’s Contribution to a Joint Policy in the Black Sea Region," President Adamkus told a Berlin audience of members of the Bundestag, journalists, ambassadors, and government officials that Germany needed to play a much more prominent role to realize the integration of the Black Sea countries into the European Union. Adamkus repeatedly emphasized that Europe should be a “community of values,” implicitly rejecting the notion that Europe should be based on a shared religious and cultural past. He argued that Europe had been "too cautious and too reluctant" to pursue its ambitions of supporting pro-democracy forces in the Black Sea region and that Europeans should be more self-confident in their ideals of a “transatlantic Europe whole and free.” In a question-and-answer session, some attendees defended Germany as having sent enough pro-European signals to the region. President Adamkus acknowledged some initiatives, but maintained there was no broader strategic vision.

According to President Adamkus, Lithuania embraces a "3+3" format for helping the South Caucasian states — in other words, the 3 Baltic states support the democratization of the 3 South-Caucasian States, Georgia, Azerbaidjan and Armenia — and said his country will plan a new democracy summit. All these initiatives, he said, can only succeed, if they find the common support of the European and transatlantic allies of Lithuania. Adamkus said he recently made a state visit to Azerbaijan, and he reported sensing considerable geo-strategic confusion among pro-Western and pro-democracy forces in the Black Sea region. Adamkus said that Europe should send a clear signal to these countries, outlining a potential vision and thereby motivating these countries to pursue further democratization and liberalization.

The Lithuanian president also touched upon a Russian-German oil pipeline project, saying he disagreed with German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, who said the pipeline was a bilateral Russian-German project of little importance to Lithuania. President Adamkus claimed that the project really did touch Lithuanian core interests. He said that he did not intend to play up tensions between the two countries, but he felt that the interests of a common “European family” did warrant Germany’s consideration of Lithuania’s interest, especially because Russia is not even part of the EU.

A full text of his remarks can be found here.

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Lithuanian leader faults EU over new gas pipeline, By Judy Dempsey, International Herald Tribune, 27 Oct., 2005.