Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what recent discussions he has had with his counterparts in (a) Latvia, (b) Lithuania and (c) Estonia about strengthening defence and security relationships with those countries.

On 24-25 March 2014, I travelled to both Latvia and Lithuania and met with the Latvian Prime Minister, Defence Minister and Foreign Minister, and the Lithuanian Foreign Minister and Vice-Minister of Defence. The focus of this visit was the situation in Ukraine. I will visit Estonia on 28-29 April and hope to meet the Estonian Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, with whom I will discuss security and defence issues. Our defence relationship, led by the Ministry of Defence, with all three Baltic countries is strong and we cooperate on a wide range of areas.