• June 12, 2013
  • 233

Polish Prime Minister defends Poles in Lithuania

Fot. Marian Paluszkiewicz

„The Lithuanian language became a hostage of the political arrangements of the governing coalition. A controversial Lithuanian language exam transforms into demands that divide the country. And at the same time, Lithuanian schools are being closed outside of the Lithuanian borders. The citizen of Lithuania should have to have very clearly explained what possible price of all of these can be.” the president of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaite said during her Tuesday’s speech in the Parliament.

„Polish-Lithuanian relations are certainly in a much more difficult phase than during my first term in office”, said Tusk during Tuesday’s press conference. „A difficult situation of Polish people in Lithuania has for sure some impact on these complications. On one hand there are legitimate aspirations of our minority, on the other hand there is sometimes inability, and sometimes unwillingness to implement them by the Lithuanian authorities”, the Prime Minister said.

In Tuesday’s State of the Union speech, the president of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaite criticized the decision of the Lithuanian minister of education and science Dainius Pavalkis about the introduction of concessions in Lithuanian language for high school graduates of national minorities’ school, including Polish ones.

According to Tusk, we need mutual patience and mutual respect. „We will be certainly supporting all the activities of Poles in Lithuania while fully respecting the sovereignty of Lithuania.” said the Prime Minister.

„It is obvious to me that the Poles living in Lithuania must also be loyal citizens of the state of Lithuania, but at the same time we will expect more empathy and understanding of the Lithuanian authorities for the Poles living there, because most of their expectations are certainly not some extravagance and they deserve more serious treatment than before”, announced the Prime Minister.

Grybauskaite said in the Tuesday’s speech that „the Lithuanian language became a hostage of the political arrangements of the governing coalition.” According to her „a controversial Lithuanian language exam equals new demands which lead to the division of the society.” At the same time, the president pointed out the fact that „Lithuanian schools are being closed outside of the Lithuanian borders.” By pointing that out, she reminded about the plans of councilors from Puńsk (Podlaskie) to close three rural schools with Lithuanian as the language of instruction.

The Lithuanian langauge matura exams have been standarized this year for graduates of all schools, even though the Lithuanian language in non-Lithuanian schools was taught to a lesser extent. Therefore, at the request of the Electoral Action of Poles in Lithuania, there were introduced some consessions during the Lithuanian language matura exams. This fact in turn caused resentment in some Lithuanian circles. The case of the exam went even to court. The decision is to be made in June.

Source: http://kurierwilenski.lt/2013/06/12/premier-polski-broni-polakow-na-litwie/

Tłumaczenie by Justyna Kaczmarek w ramach praktyk w Europejskiej Fundacji Praw Człowieka, www.efhr.eu. Translated by Justyna Kaczmarek within the framework of a traineeship programme of the European Foundation of Human Rights, www.efhr.eu. 

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