Education and Science, EU – Baltic States, Legislation, Lithuania

Knut Vollebaek.

The Lithuanian education minister, meanwhile, expects that the international community will see both sides after complaints from the Poles as the OSCE commissioner plans to announce his conclusions after his next week's visit to Poland. OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities Knut Vollebaek came to Lithuania on a three day visit. After meeting with high officials Monday, he will go Tuesday to the Salcininkai district and visit Polish and Russian schools, reports LETA/ELTA.

"We are worried. It is tension, not a conflict but tension. My aim is to try to identify the problem before it escalates into a serious conflict," Vollebaek told the LTV news service. "This visit could have been prompted by public complaints from various minorities, particularly from the Polish minorities," Education Minister Gintaras Steponavicius said. The new amendments to the Lithuanian Law on Education provide that in two years national minority pupils will have to take the same examination of the Lithuanian language as Lithuanian school leavers. The Lithuanian language teaching is also to be extended, which is actively opposed by the Polish minority. The Poles in Lithuania showed their dissatisfaction with the extended teaching of the Lithuanian language by staging a rally which was the largest since the notorious 2009 rally outside the Seimas. This autumn, some of the classes had to be taught in Lithuanian, but representatives of Polish schools said that they continue teaching in Polish. The consulate of Poland gave PLN 1,000 to each of the Polish first formers who chose precisely a Polish school. "The reason of my coming here is the situation between the Polish national minority and the Lithuanians that we are hearing about& Next week, I will go to Poland to assess the situation of the Lithuanian national minority in Poland. Then I will present my conclusions," the OSCE high commissioner said. No matter what the conclusions are, the OSCE will continue discussions and consultations with Lithuania and Poland for some time, Vollebaek said.

The OSCE high commissioner was interested in the reforms established in the new law for the education of national minorities in Lithuania. Vollebaek also noted that the opportunity to learn in the state language was important for the integration of national minorities, but is no less important to help them preserve their national identity. Minister Steponavicius stressed that the law aims to provide better conditions for the youth to integrate into the society rather than to assimilate with it by the extended teaching of the Lithuanian language in national minority schools.