A citywide petition gained over 22,500 signatures, sparking debate over a proposed A2 Lithuanian requirement for non EU residents seeking long term residency.<\/p>\n
A petition launched by the Mayor of Vilnius calling for foreigners to have mandatory knowledge of Lithuanian was signed by more than 22,500 people.<\/p>\n
According to LRT, the petition was confirmed by the local news service; it was also noted that the signature drive lasted one month.<\/p>\n
Vilnius Mayor Valdas Benkunskas proposed introducing a rule: citizens of countries not part of the EU who wish to reside in Lithuania for more than three years must have Lithuanian at least at level A2.<\/p>\n
According to him, for foreign citizens who plan to live long-term in Vilnius and Lithuania, this is a reality, but they must take on the responsibility of learning the basics of the state language.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a principle that makes sense, and it is supported by the majority. Unfortunately, when I spoke about it, the Minister of Internal Affairs politely shelved my proposal in the long drawer. Therefore, having a mandate for changes from tens of thousands of residents of Vilnius and Lithuania, I sent the minister a letter proposing a meeting. The Minister of Internal Affairs said that he invites me to come to the ministry, so I hope he keeps his word\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2013 Valdas Benkunskas<\/p>\n
The government\u2019s plans include further steps for integrating foreigners: creating conditions for learning the state language in the most convenient way \u2013 from self-study and informal sessions to academic courses.<\/p>\n
They also report that the ministry is already preparing amendments to legal acts that will encourage foreigners to learn Lithuanian.<\/p>\n
In this context, Lithuania\u2019s authorities continue to discuss possible language-integration measures and the corresponding steps to facilitate foreigners\u2019 adaptation.<\/p>\n
Language integration and future steps<\/p>\n
As expected, the government discussion on language requirements for newcomers continues: the goal is to make the process of learning the Lithuanian language more accessible and useful for all who wish to settle in Lithuania.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A citywide petition gained over 22,500 signatures, sparking debate over a proposed A2 Lithuanian requirement for non EU…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":107184,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[93],"tags":[54425,54426,171,54427,38,54428,170,54429,54424],"class_list":["post-107183","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-vilnius","tag-a2-proficiency","tag-language-integration","tag-lithuania","tag-lithuanian-language-requirement","tag-news","tag-non-eu-residents","tag-vilnius","tag-vilnius-mayor","tag-vilnius-mayor-lithuanian-language-requirement-a2-proficiency-non-eu-residents-language-integration"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/116743070542663417","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107183","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107183"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107183\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/107184"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107183"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107183"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107183"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}