MINSK, September 29. /TASS/. The Belarusian Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that symmetric restrictive measures will enter into effect Tuesday against Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia in response to sanctions, imposed by these countries on Minsk, Belarusian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Anatoly Glaz told BelTA news agency.
"Starting today, as we promised earlier, we also introduce retaliatory symmetric restrictive measures against each of these countries. We have said already that this is going to be a downward spiral, launched by certain Lithuanian officials. We will keep responding, but we will never initiate such steps," he underscored.
The ministry spokesman disclosed that Minsk compiled its own sanctions lists for Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. Each list includes about 100 officials, banned from entering Belarus.
On August 31, the Baltic countries slapped sanctions on 30 Belarusian officials. A five-year entry ban was imposed on President Alexander Lukashenko, ministers of the interior and justice, the prosecutor general, as well as representatives of the Presidential Administration, the Central Electoral Commission and the national security agencies. On September 25, the Baltics extended that list to 100 officials.
On September 2, Belarusian Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei announced that Belarus approved the retaliatory sanctions list against the Baltic states as a response to their sanctions.