A foreword written by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov is raising concerns in Eastern Europe that Moscow is once again laying the groundwork to challenge a neighbor’s international borders. Lavrov’s preface appears in a monograph titled “The History of Lithuania,” published in March but only recently noticed by journalists. The book questions the existence of the Lithuanian language and the very statehood of modern-day Lithuania

Earlier this week, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Kestutis Budrys called the monograph a tool of Russian propaganda and likened its message to Vladimir Putin’s July 2021 essay, On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians, in which the president rejected the foundations of Ukrainian sovereignty[…]
In his foreword, Lavrov accuses the Baltic states, including Lithuania, of trying to “use falsified historical narratives to incite anti-Russian and Russophobic sentiments.” The book, he says, pushes back against this trend

The monograph, The History of Lithuania, was published in 2025 by the Moscow State Institute of International Relations’ publishing house. The lead author of the nine-member team was Maxim Grigoryev, head of the pro-Kremlin Foundation for the Study of Democracy Problems, a member of Russia’s Civic Chamber, and chair of the “International Public Tribunal on the Crimes of Ukrainian Neo-Nazis.” Grigoryev is also a veteran of Russia’s war in Ukraine[…]
In the book’s chapter on Lithuania after its separation from the USSR, Grigoryev, Grabauskas, and their coauthors argue that the country today “officially considers itself the successor of the Lithuania of the pro-Nazi dictatorship” under Antanas Smetona. They also write that the “contemporary Lithuanian regime” embraces a “pro-Nazi” ideology and survives “largely” thanks to “police measures and the suppression of dissent”