Lithuania's prime minister says the country has evacuation plans and will fight back if Russia attacks

Lithuania's prime minister has told the BBC that his government has drawn up evacuation plans for its citizens in case of a Russian attack, while insisting that Lithuanians would not surrender.

Prime Minister Mindaugas Sinkevičius said Lithuanians feel "constantly threatened" by Russia, citing drones that have entered the country's airspace. "We face concrete threats, not on a daily basis, but we're experiencing them and it's a true reality for us," he told Newsnight.

He described plans covering "a variety of scenarios," including moving elderly residents out of cities without the traffic jams that could trap civilians. Not all of the planning is public, he said. "We're thinking about a variety of scenarios, not all of them are being discussed very much publicly."

Lithuania shares a land border with the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad and borders Belarus, a close Russian ally. It joined NATO in 2004 alongside Estonia and Latvia, placing all three under the alliance's Article 5 mutual-defense commitment.

The interview came after NATO fighter pilots shot down a drone that entered Lithuanian airspace last week. Defence Minister Robertas Kaunas told Newshour the drone came from the direction of Belarus, though its origins have not been confirmed. Moscow did not comment on the incident.

Lithuania has reported what it calls "hybrid attacks" throughout the past year and blames Belarus for them. Late Monday, flights were disrupted at Vilnius airport after the airports operator described a "hybrid attack carried out by Belarus" involving objects that appeared to resemble balloons. The president's chief adviser, Deividas Matulionis, said Tuesday it was unclear whether the objects were actually balloons.

Drone incursions have become common across Europe since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Vilnius residents took shelter in May after a drone alert grounded flights and rail travel. NATO jets have scrambled multiple times this year to shoot down stray Ukrainian drones that crossed into Estonia and Latvia — drones Ukraine attributes to Russian electronic warfare altering their flight paths.

Germany pledged in 2023 to permanently station a combat-ready brigade in Lithuania and expects it to be operational by 2027, numbering about 5,000 soldiers and civilian employees. The brigade has not recruited enough personnel voluntarily and is now using compulsory assignments to fill some positions. Most troops will be based in Rūdninkai, near the Suwałki Gap — the strip of land linking Belarus with Kaliningrad between Lithuania and Poland.

Sinkevičius said the UK needed a "shift in the mindset" on defence, while noting that Lithuania sits "closer to the border and closer to [the] threat." UK Defence Secretary Wes Streeting praised the response to last week's drone incursion, saying NATO had "demonstrated our readiness to protect our airspace."

The prime minister's message was two parts: a government preparing its people to leave, and a country preparing not to. "We will fight back," he said. "We will engage."