Lithuania to increase defence spending

 Lithuania is ready to meet the target of using two percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on defence expenditure in the next five years, President Dalia Grybauskaite said Thursday.

"It is necessary to renew without any delay the national agreement between all political parties on foreign and security policies, and also on adequate finances for defence," Xinhua quoted Grybauskaite as saying in his address to parliament.

Lithuania's current budget for defence equals 0.8 percent of GDP and is one of the smallest in the NATO members.

"There is no other way, and we must be able to defend ourselves until help arrives," Grybauskaite echoed Obama's stance during her annual statement in Vilnius.

US President Obama expressed his concern about decreasing defence budgets in some of NATO nations in Brussels Wednesday after the EU-US summit.