Lithuania
Country in northern Europe, bounded north by Latvia, east by Belarus, south by Poland and the Kaliningrad area of Russia, and west by the Baltic Sea.
Government
Lithuania has a multiparty semi-presidential political system. Under its 1992 constitution, Lithuania is a democratic-pluralist state, with a predominantly parliamentary form of executive, although the president retains considerable power in the selection of a prime minister. There is a 141-member parliament, the Seimas, directly elected for a four-year term and comprising 71 members elected in single-member constituencies and 70 by proportional representation from a nationwide constituency. The president, who must be at least 40 years old, is directly elected and can serve a maximum of two consecutive five-year terms. The president oversees foreign and national security policy. With the approval of parliament, the president appoints a prime minister, who shares executive power with a council of ministers. The president also appoints a third of the nine members of the constitutional court.History
Lithuania was united as a single nation in 1236 by Grand Duke Mindaugas, who became king in 1253. The Teutonic Knights (German crusaders) who attempted to invade in the 13th century were successfully driven back. In the 14th century Lithuania extended its boundaries and became one of the largest states in Europe, occupying present-day Belarus and Ukraine and reaching eastwards almost as far as Moscow and the Black Sea. The population was converted to Christianity in the 14th century. In 1386 Lithuania's Grand Duke Jogaila became king of Poland to unite the two countries in a mutually beneficial confederation. The two became a single state in 1569, known as the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, in which Lithuania maintained a separate army and currency. In 1795, as part of a partition of Poland among Russia, Prussia, and Austria, most of Lithuania came under the control of the Russian tsar. Revolts in 1831 and 1863 failed to win independence for the state, and a more organized movement for the independence of Lithuania emerged in the 1880s. When self-government was demanded in 1905, this was refused by the Russians.Struggle for independence
During World War I Lithuania was occupied by German troops. After the war, it declared independence in February 1918 but the USSR claimed Lithuania as a Soviet republic in 1918. Soviet forces were overthrown by the Germans, Poles, and nationalist Lithuanians in 1919, and a democratic republic was established, although the capital, Vilnius, was annexed by Poland 1920–39. A left-wing democratically elected government was overthrown in a military coup in 1926 and Antanas Smetona became president, with dictatorial powers. In 1939 Germany took control of part of Lithuania, handing it to the USSR later the same year under the terms of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. In 1940 Lithuania was incorporated as a constituent republic of the USSR, designated the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic. In 1941, after German troops had invaded the USSR, Lithuania's nationalists returned briefly to power and assisted the Nazis in the swift systematic slaughter of 90% (more than 130,000) Lithuanian Jews, communists, and other ‘undesirables’. The Germans occupied Lithuania 1941–44, after which Soviet rule was restored. Fierce guerrilla resistance to the ‘sovietization’ policies of forcible agricultural collectivization and persecution of the Roman Catholic Church continued until the 1950s. Overall, in the years 1940–54 Lithuania lost nearly 800,000 people, including between 120,000 and 300,000 exiled to Siberia and many also emigrating.An intelligentsia- and Roman Catholic Church-led dissident movement was in place during the 1960s and 1970s, and this grew in strength during the 1980s, influenced by the Polish example and the glasnost (‘political openness’) and perestroika (‘economic restructuring’) policies espoused by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. In October 1988 a popular front, the Sajudis (Lithuanian Restructuring Movement), was formed to campaign for increased autonomy and the supreme soviet (state assembly), to the chagrin of Russian immigrants, declared Lithuanian the state language and readopted the flag of the independent interwar republic. In December 1989 the republic's Communist Party split into two, with the majority wing, led by first secretary Aligirdas Brazauskas, formally breaking away from the Communist Party of the USSR and establishing itself as a social-democratic, Lithuanian-nationalist body. A multiparty system was established and the Sajudis-backed pro-separatist candidates secured a majority in the February–March 1990 elections. In March 1990 Vytautas Landsbergis became president and Lithuania unilaterally declared its independence. The USSR responded by imposing an economic blockade, which was lifted in July 1990 after the supreme council agreed to suspend the independence declaration.
In January 1991, Soviet paratroopers briefly seized political and communications buildings in Vilnius that had been nationalized by the Lithuanian government after it had rescinded its declaration of independence. Thirteen civilians were killed in the attack, which increased ethnic Lithuanian support for independence, and in a national referendum in February 1991, 90% of voters backed re-establishment of an independent Lithuania.
Independence achieved
After the failure of an August 1991 attempted anti-Gorbachev coup by conservative communists in Moscow, in September 1991 the USSR and Western nations recognized Lithuania's declaration of independence, and the Communist Party was outlawed.Since independence, Lithuania has developed close relations with Western states but also worked to improve relations with Russia. It became a member of the United Nations in September 1991; entered into a free-trade agreement with the other Baltic States, Estonia and Latvia, in September 1993; signed a friendship and cooperation treaty with Poland and applied for NATO membership in 1994; and signed a trade and cooperation agreement with the European Union (EU) in June 1995. The last Russian troops departed in August 1993 and Lithuania and Russia signed a state border treaty in October 1997.
Lithuania's economy fell into severe recession immediately after independence as it sought to forge new trading relations and as industries were privatized. By 1996, although the bulk of the economy was in private hands, the rate of growth of the economy remained slow and lagged behind its Baltic partners, Estonia and Latvia, in terms of economic reform. The rate of unemployment was 8% and inflation stood at 25%. From 2000 the rate of economic growth picked up to around 8% a year and by 2006 the unemployment rate had fallen to under 3%.
Political instability
During the decade after independence Lithuania had a succession of short-lived coalition governments. Accused of mismanaging economic reform, Lithuania's Sajudis nationalists suffered a crushing defeat in the October–November 1992 elections to a new legislature, the Seimas. The ex-communist Democratic Labour Party (LDLP), now a social-democratic force, won a parliamentary majority, and in February 1993 its leader Algirdas Brazauskas was directly elected president, pledging more gradual and less painful free-market reforms. Adolfas Slezevicius became prime minister. The Sajudis was replaced by a new party, the Homeland Union–Lithuanian Conservatives (Tevynes Santara), led by former president Landsbergis.In March 1996 Slezevicius resigned over his involvement in a banking scandal. He was replaced by Laurynas Stankevicius. After elections in November 1996, a new conservative coalition was formed, led by Gediminas Vagnorius, a reform-minded economist, and dominated by the Homeland Union, in alliance with the Lithuanian Christian Democratic Party (LKDP) and Lithuanian Centre Union. In the presidential election in January 1998 Valdas Adamkus was elected president of the country. He pledged to develop Lithuania's integration with Western Europe and to deepen its links with the USA. In May 1999, Vagnorius resigned as prime minister and was replaced by Rolandas Paksas, who in turn stepped down in October 1999 after his opposition to privatization of an oil company to a US company was opposed by cabinet colleagues. Andris Kubilius of the ruling Homeland Union became the new prime minister, heading a coalition with the Christian Democrats (LKDP).
The ruling conservative government won only 9% of the vote in the October 2000 parliamentary elections. The Social Democrats won the greatest number of seats, but a new populist centre-left coalition was formed, led by former prime minister Rolandas Paksas, and comprising two liberal parties and eight independents. However, policy remained the same: developing a free market economy; reducing rates of income and corporate tax; joining NATO and the EU; and attracting foreign investment. In June 2001 Paksas resigned as prime minister. He was replaced in July 2001 by former president Algirdas Brazauskas, who remained in position until June 2006 when he resigned and retired from politics after President Adamkus expressed no confidence in two of his ministers. In July 2006 Gediminas Kirkilas of Social Democrats became prime minister.
EU and NATO membership
On 1 May 2004 Lithuania became a member of the EU. This followed a 2003 referendum in which 90% of voters favoured accession. In March 2004 it became a full member of NATO. In May 2001, it became a member of the World Trade Organization.How to thank TFD for its existence? Tell a friend about us, add a link to this page, add the site to iGoogle, or visit webmaster's page for free fun content.
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