Lithuania prepares mine defences at border « Euro Weekly News

In a dramatic move that breaks decades of international consensus, Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania have initiated the process of withdrawing from the Ottawa Treaty. This global agreement bans antipersonnel mines. Their goal is to defend their borders with weapons, as was done during the brutality of the Cold War. Lithuania’s government confirmed plans to manufacture and deploy hundreds of thousands of landmines that form a defensive barrier along its frontier with Belarus, and indirectly, Russia. 

We will see how the Baltic nations are walking away from the global landmine ban and why they believe conventional deterrence matters more than diplomacy, and how Russia’s war in Ukraine is reshaping what’s Europe considers acceptable. This is more than a border policy and a deeper redefinition of what security looks like when trust is gone in Europe.

The treaty breakaway

For more than two decades, the Ottawa Treaty, also known as the global landmine ban, has stood as one of the clearest rules in humanitarian law. Signed by 165 countries, it drew a line: no more making, moving, or using anti-personnel landmines.

On May 8, 2025, Lithuania officially told the UN it plans to leave the landmine treaty — a step that other Baltic countries have also taken this year.

Latvia had already taken similar steps in April, and Estonia followed in early June 2025. 

All three countries invoked Article 20 of the convention, which allows for withdrawal with six months’ notice.

By late 2025, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia will be legally permitted to manufacture, store, and deploy landmines within their borders. It’s a break from Europe’s usual stance — and one that puts them in open disagreement with the UN and most of their EU allies. It raises a new question when fear returns: how fast will the international norms collapse?

What Lithuania plans to build 

Lithuania’s Defence Minister, Laurynas Kasčiūnas, has publicly confirmed the country’s plan to manufacture and deploy hundreds of thousands of anti-personnel landmines across key points along its eastern border. These won’t stand alone. They’re part of what he called a “layered deterrence strategy” — one that includes:

Anti-tank obstacles
Remote-controlled drone systems
Long-range artillery and missile defences

These mines will be produced domestically, and Lithuania is currently investing heavily, with more than €800 million allocated in 2025, equivalent to roughly 5.5% of its own GDP. This is a necessary expenditure, a kind of national insurance policy in an era where unpredictability is no longer theoretical.

Lithuania aims to transform its eastern border into a buffer zone that can buy time, raise the cost of aggression, and make every metre a contested area. 

Why the shift towards landmines?

To understand the origins of this decision, it is necessary to examine the fear and pressure these countries have endured over the past few years.

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Baltic states, including Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, have seen the worst fears confirmed. 
They have seen that Ukraine is now considered one of the most mined countries in the world.

In that light, Baltic officials no longer view landmines just as a risk to civilians, but as a grim necessity. For them, it’s a way to slow an enemy down and buy time before backup arrives.

The officials argue that they’re not discarding methods for responding to a new security reality where treaty obligations offer no protection if a neighbouring state ignores them. 

Russia has never signed the treaty, nor have the US or China and for the countries that sit directly on NATO’s eastern frontier, that proximity matters in history.

The moral cost 

Landmines are a symbol of indiscriminate violence that has been outlawed for good reason. Human rights groups, including International Campaigns to Ban Landmines, Amnesty International, and the Red Cross, all condemned the Baltic withdrawals. 

Because once the landmines are deployed, they don’t expire cleanly and they don’t always stay where they are placed.

Lithuania states that it produces mines strategically with electronic tracking and deactivation systems. Still, humanitarian groups are more cautious because history shows us that mines often outlast their militaries and end up in fields where no war remains.

 So while the Baltic sees this as a shield, others see a long-term hazard, a defence that protects now but will haunt later.