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It is not without pride that Lithuanians have cultivated their reputation among Estonians and Latvians as ‘southerners’ and ‘Italians of the Baltics’. By Baltic standards, they are more relaxed and easy-going - even if this can be described as reserved by Central European standards. Lithuania is also architecturally southern European: many of the façades in the capital city of Vilnius were designed by Italian baroque artists, and in summer in particular, the cafés are characterised by a southern lightness. The national sport of basketball, in which the country is one of the top international teams, is also a source of heated emotions. Lithuanians are proud of their language, which has hardly changed for centuries and still retains many
which still contains many elements of the Indo-European language family that have been lost elsewhere. The largest country in the Baltic region has Vilnius, Kaunas, Klaipėda, Šiauliai and Panevėžys are other important industrial centres. Important sectors are important sectors alongside the laser industry are metal processing and mechanical engineering, the building materials, food, electrical and chemical
chemical industries as well as the wood, paper and furniture sectors.
Facts
- Total population: 2.9 million (2024)
- Area: 65,284 km²
- Capital: Vilnius
- Neighbouring countries: Latvia, Belarus, Poland, Russia (Kaliningrad region)
- Business languages: Lithuanian, English, Russian, German
- Currency: Euro since 1 January 2015
- System of government: Parliamentary republic
- Head of state: President Gitanas Nausėda, assumed office: 12 July 2019 (re-elected on 26 May 2024)
- Head of government: Prime Minister Gintautas Paluckas, took office: 12 December 2024, LSDP
- Parliament: Unicameral parliament ‘Seimas’, 141 deputies
Econcomy
- Inflation rate 2023: 9.1%
- National debt 2023: 38,3%
- Unemployment rate 2023: 6.96%
- Imports 2023: EUR 52.54 billion
- Exports 2023: EUR 44.31 billion
- Ease of doing business 2020: 11th place out of 190 evaluated countries
- World Competitiveness Ranking 2024: 29th place out of 67 countries
- Corruption Perception Index 2023: 34th place out of 180 countries evaluated
Infrastructure
Information will follow.
History
The weakening of the Tsarist Empire during the First World War led to the proclamation of the independent Republic of Lithuania in February 1918 - under German occupation - with Kaunas as its capital. The new parliamentary democracy established in 1922 was abolished a few years later by the coup led by Antanas Smetona. He ruled dictatorially until 1940, when the Soviet Union forced Lithuania to join the USSR. In the summer of 1941, German Wehrmacht troops occupied Lithuanian territory in a blitzkrieg, and the Nazis murdered around 90% of the country's Jewish population by the end of the war. In 1944, the Red Army returned and re-established the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic. Stalin brutally stifled resistance to Soviet rule until the end of the decade.
As part of perestroika, Lithuania declared itself a sovereign state in 1990. On 13 January 1991, the so-called Vilnius Bloody Sunday (lit. Sausio įvykiai), pro-Soviet military forces unsuccessfully attempted to overthrow the young democracy. 14 young demonstrators were crushed by tanks at the Vilnius TV tower. In response, 85% of Lithuanians declared their support for independence in a referendum on 8 February 1991. In August 1991, the countries of the West recognised the independence of the Baltic states.
After an initial economic crisis and political instability due to the rapid transformation of the economy, the reform policy gained increasing momentum, especially after the Russian crisis was overcome in 2000. The Republic of Lithuania became a member of the European Union and NATO in 2004, and in 2007 the country became part of the Schengen area. The euro was introduced as Lithuania's currency at the beginning of 2015.