Legislation, Lithuania, Security

The minister said he was resigning "for the sake of the public interest and stability in the country in the face of general global threat", cites LETA/BNS.

Skvernelis and the police leadership have come under fire for the Thursday incident in Vilnius when a man escaped from a police car and took a police officer's AK-74.

Speaker of the Lithuanian Seimas Loreta Grauziniene hoped Interior Minister Saulius Skvernelis' resignation will be accepted.

"I hope the prime minister, who has always declared his honesty, integrity, care for people, will do that and will accept Skvernelis' resignation," she told BNS on Friday night, adding that the interior minister's resignation was the only right decision.

Commenting on Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevicius' hope that Skvernelis would reconsider his resignation, the speaker said it was part of the party's election campaign.

"I have information that Skvernelis will be put in the fifth place on the Social Democrats' candidate list (in the upcoming Seimas elections – BNS). In this case, the prime minister is thinking about the elections and the party ratings, and not about responsibility to Lithuania's people, officers, Vilnius residents who were alarmed all night," Grauziniene told BNS.