The pen is inscribed EU-Ukraine Association Agreement
Vilnius, 29 November 2013.
Julius Pranevicius, the consul general of Lithuania who is based in New York, brought it with him to Lawrenceville March 27 where he gave a lecture on the Ukrainian crisis at Georgia Gwinnett College.
He opened its case, withdrew the pen and let the students pass it around the lecture hall. It went from hand-to-hand lingering longer with some than others.
On that fateful day — Nov. 29, 2013, Mr. Pranevicius was in Vilnius, Lithuania’s capital, as an observer to the negotiations involving the Ukrainian government and the European Union including the involvement of Russia.
Since Lithuania had assumed the presidency of the European Union Council at the time, Mr. Pranevicius participated in the negotiations as Lithuania’s representative to the council.
From the start the negotiations were on a bumpy road, but the road just kept getting bumpier until they hit a roadblock placed in their way by Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Ukraine’s president, Viktor Yanukovych, admitted in a television interview on the 26th that Mr. Putin had told him to delay signing the agreement. Mr. Yanukovych remained in Vilnius through the 29th but the agreement was not signed as had been anticipated on that day.
If Mr. Pranevicius’ pen had been used for its original purpose, or even just as a memento of a successful conclusion to the negotiations, the situation in the Ukraine could be very different today. The 29th was a fateful day not because what happened in Vilnius, but what didn’t happen there.
On the 30th, however, in Kiev, Ukraine’s capital, all hell broke loose when police cracked down on pro-European students. Clashes escalated through February 2014 when anti-government protests in Kiev’s Maidan Square left more than 100 dead — the protesters who died are now known as “the Heavenly 100.”
By late February, Mr. Yanukovych fled to Russia as his government collapsed, leaving a pro-Europe government in charge.
Mr. Pranevicius made it quite clear that in his opinion the current fighting in eastern portions of the Ukraine is underpinned by the Putin government’s political purpose of stirring up nationalism at home to divert attention away from the country’s economic problems.
While Russia may be reluctant to invade these portions of the Ukraine now, he doesn’t trust commentators who think that the Russian government is satisfied to keep the tension just slightly over fever pitch — at slightly more than 37 degrees Celsius. — in a tragic waiting game.
The conflict is not simply between Ukrainian and Russian speakers, he added. “I know Ukrainians who speak only Russian and are supporting the Ukrainian government and fighting for Ukraine.”
He also underscored that once Russia took control of Abkhasia and South Ossetia in the Republic of Georgia, there was a sense that its ambitions had been satiated. Its take over of Crimea put an end to that assumption, he said.
Aside from its embassy in Washington, Lithuania maintains Consulates General in New York and Chicago.
While in Atlanta Mr. Pranevicius was hosted by Dr. Romualda Klicius, Lithuania’s honorary consul here. He also met with members of the Lithuanian community.
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