The military officer, who has served in the Lithuanian Armed Forces since the restoration of independence, has held the office of Chief of Defense Staff in recent years, after serving as Lithuania’s military representative to NATO, commanding a mission in Afghanistan and holding other high-ranking positions.
The ceremony to honor the general’s retirement from active service, which will take place at a square in front of the Ministry of Defense, will be attended by Defense Minister Raimundas Karoblis and Chief of Defense of Lithuania Lieutenant General Valdemaras Rupsys.
According to Karoblis, the general has made an important contribution to what the Lithuanian Armed Forces are nowadays.
“His biography of military service reflects by far all of the milestones in the development of the Lithuanian Armed Forces, from the first transformation of the then Joint Staff and preparation of the Armed Forces for the accession to NATO, to the reconstruction of Ghor Province – a military operation of unseen scale in Lithuania at that time – and the duties of a military representative to NATO at the junction of major changes when Russia’s aggression in Ukraine altered the approach towards our region’s security both among us and our allies,” the minister told BNS.