- June 19, 2014
- 356
Kirkilas: No consensus on the Law on National Minorities in the coalition
Antoni RadczenkoAccoring to a member of the Seimas Gediminas Kirkilas, the Social Democrats sill want to adopt the Law on National Minorities but some members of the governing coalition are reluctant to do so.
“We still support the bill but there’s no consensus on the matter in the coalition, so we can’t submit it to the Seimas. There would be no point in doing so, since the bill would likely be rejected. When the coalition reaches a compromise, we’ll submit the bill,” Gediminas Kirkilas told zw.lt. The member of the Social Democratic Party of Lithuania hopes that the Seimas will discuss the draft law next Thursday.
Last Thursday, Seimas removed two draft bills from the agenda: a draft Law on National Minorities that is supposed to regulate bilingual signs in town densely populated by ethnic minorities, and a draft Law on the Spelling of Names and Surnames.The former was removed in response to the proposal of the ruling Social Democrats, while the latter was removed in response to the proposal of the conservatives.
The decision was criticized by the Deputy Speaker Jarosław Narkiewicz of the Electoral Action of Poles in Lithuania. “That formed majority of left- and right-wingers doesn’t actually care about the situation of many citizens of Lithuania. The rejection of the bill and the refusal to consider it mean that you avoid finding a way to solve the problem. By not allowing the bill to be read, you’re contradicting yourselves and, above all, deceiving Lithuanian citizens,” he said in Seimas, addressing his coalition partners.
The Lithuanian Seimas removes a draft bill on national minorities from the agenda
Antoni Radczenko
Tłumaczenie by Michał M. Kowalski w ramach praktyk w Europejskiej Fundacji Praw Człowieka, www.efhr.eu. Translated by Michał M. Kowalski within the framework of a traineeship programme of the European Foundation of Human Rights, www.efhr.eu.
