During the working lunch with French President Nicolas Sarcozy in Gdansk, heads of state and government of the Baltic, Visegrád countries, Bulgaria and Romania discussed EU’s Climate and Energy Package adoptable in the Brussels European Council next week.

The leaders of the nine Central and Eastern European EU members stated that the prospect of cutting carbon emissions will put the developing economies into difficulties.

Acting Prime Minister Gediminas Kirkilas underlined that Lithuania was for the pollution reduction targets and has reduced carbon emissions by 53 % since 1990, on the other hand, as a developing economy, Lithuania has to take into account such challenges as the closure of the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant, which would result in an annual extra five 5 million tonnes in CO2 emissions, as the only way to meet electricity demand in Lithuania, isolated from the EU energy market, would be by using gas but from one and only supplier: Russia.

Gediminas Kirkilas pointed out that the EU solidarity on climate change should be based on fair decisions which do not discriminate developing countries and take into account the impact of the global financial crisis. Gediminas Kirkilas was confident that a solution will be found by the end of the French EU Presidency.

At the end of the lunch, Gediminas Kirkilas took the opportunity to express his appreciation to the heads of state and government for their cooperation during his term in office as a prime minister.