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Agnija Tumkevič
cross-border process. This initiative is expected to be implemented
during Lithuania’s Presidency and is based on EU legislative proposals.
Due to this, the results of the “Smart borders” initiative will depend
more on the work done by countries presiding before Lithuania. On
the other hand, Lithuania has already identified several objectives
under this priority, emphasizing the importance of strengthening
cooperation among all institutions protecting EU borders, such
as customs, state border guard services, state food and veterinary
services, etc. In this regard, the conference of intergovernmental
institutions involved in external border management in the EU will
be organized. On the other hand, this priority area has just taken
shape and its main targets and indicators are still to be determined.
The institutional model of Lithuania’s preparation process
A number of institutions have taken part in the preparation for the EU
Presidency: the government, President’s Office, Parliament, all ministries
and their subordinate agencies, as well as the Permanent Representation of
Lithuania to the European Union. The latter will be extremely important in
the implementation of Lithuania’s Presidency programme, as a “Brusselsbased
presidency” model has been chosen. At the same time, most of the
internal questions of the preparation process have been regularly discussed
during governmental sessions and meetings of the Parliamentary committee
on European Affairs. The Lithuanian model for the coordination of EU
affairs was further developed in 2009 when the Government commission
on EU Affairs 7 was set up and became the main centre of priority setting
and decision making. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs was also assigned as
the executive coordinator for the preparation of the Presidency and an additional
Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs was appointed, as political leader
responsible for the coordination of EU affairs. Another component of the
preparation process is the inter-service network of coordinators, composed
of ministries, Parliament members, the Office of the President and the Office
7 The main aim of the Government commission on EU Affairs is to assist the government in
the implementation of the coordinated European policy. The group comprises of representatives
from all ministries, Office of the Prime Minister and the Permanent Representation of Lithuania to
the EU. This is the main working group, which manages the preparation process.