Lithuania is a European country located on the south-eastern shore of the Baltic Sea. It is a member of the United Nations, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the European Union, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and the World Trade Organisation. Currently, Lithuania maintains diplomatic relations with 186 states. It became a member of the United Nations on 18 September 1991, and is a signatory to a number of its organizations and other international agreements. It is also a member of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, NATO and its adjunct North Atlantic Coordinating Council, the Council of Europe, and the European Union. Lithuania gained membership in the World Trade Organization on 31 May 2001.
Vilnius, previously known in English as Vilna, is the capital of and largest city in Lithuania and the second-most-populous city in the Baltic states. The city's estimated July 2024 population was 605,270, and the Vilnius urban area has an estimated population of 708,627.
Lithuanian is an East Baltic language belonging to the Baltic branch of the Indo-European language family. It is the language of Lithuanians and the official language of Lithuania as well as one of the official languages of the European Union. There are approximately 2.8 million native Lithuanian speakers in Lithuania and about 1 million speakers elsewhere. Around half a million inhabitants of Lithuania of non-Lithuanian background speak Lithuanian daily as a second language.
Kaunas is the second-largest city in Lithuania after Vilnius, the fourth largest city in the Baltic States and an important centre of Lithuanian economic, academic, and cultural life. Kaunas was the largest city and the centre of a county in the Duchy of Trakai of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Trakai Palatinate since 1413. In the Russian Empire, it was the capital of the Kaunas Governorate from 1843 to 1915.
The coat of arms of Lithuania is a mounted armoured knight holding a sword and shield, known as Vytis. Since the early 15th century, it has been Lithuania's official coat of arms and is one of the oldest European coats of arms. It is also known by other names in various languages, such as Waykimas, Pagaunė in the Lithuanian language or as Pogonia, Pogoń, Пагоня in the Polish, and Belarusian languages. Vytis is translatable as Chase, Pursuer, Knight or Horseman, similar to the Slavic vityaz. Historically – raitas senovės karžygys or in heraldry – raitas valdovas.
Lithuania is now a country in the Baltic region of Europe.
The June Uprising was a brief period of the history of Lithuania in late June 1941 between the first Soviet and the Nazi occupations.
Vilnius District Municipality is one of the 60 municipalities in Lithuania. It surrounds the capital city of Vilnius on three sides. The municipality is also bordered by Trakai district and Elektrėnai municipality in the west, Astravyets and Ashmyany districts of Belarus in the east, Širvintos, Molėtai and Švenčionys districts in the north and Šalčininkai district in the south.
Ypatingasis būrys or Special Squad of the German Security Police and SD was a killing squad operating in the Vilnius Region in 1941–1944. The unit, primarily composed of Lithuanian volunteers, was formed by the German occupation government and was subordinate to Einsatzkommando 9 and later to Sicherheitsdienst (SD) and Sicherheitspolizei (Sipo).p.15 The unit was subordinated to German police, and had no official autonomy. In Polish they were colloquially called strzelcy ponarscy.
Alfredas Bumblauskas is a professor at Vilnius University and one of the best known Lithuanian historians, specializing in the research of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
The State Border Guard Service or VSAT is a border control institution under the Ministry of the Interior of Lithuania charged with controlling and maintaining the security of the Lithuanian borders on land, in the Baltic Sea and the Curonian Lagoon. VSAT is a member of the EU Frontex and is responsible for the security of about 1,070 kilometres (660 mi) of the external border of the European Union with Kaliningrad Oblast and Belarus.
The first known record of the name of Lithuania recorded in the Quedlinburg Chronicle in a 9 March 1009 story of Saint Bruno. The Chronicle recorded in the form Litua. Although it is clear the name originated from a Baltic language, scholars still debate the meaning of the word.
The Voivode of Vilnius was a high-ranking officer in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania who governed the Vilnius Voivodeship from 1413. He was considered as the most influential member of the Lithuanian Council of Lords. After the Union of Lublin in 1569, the Voivodes of Vilnius were ranked as the fourth highest, while the Castellans of Vilnius were ranked as the sixth highest officers among the Voivodeships of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. After the Third Partition of the Commonwealth, the Vilnius Voivodeship was annexed by the Russian Empire and this position was annulled.
The Lithuanian Auxiliary Police was a Schutzmannschaft formation formed during the German occupation of Lithuania between 1941 and 1944, with the first battalions originating from the most reliable freedom fighters, disbanded following the 1941 anti-Soviet Lithuanian June Uprising in 1941. Lithuanian activists hoped that these units would be the basis of a reestablished Lithuanian Army commanded by the Lithuanian Provisional Government. Instead, they were put under the orders of the SS- und Polizeiführer in Lithuania.
Saulius Skvernelis is a Lithuanian politician who served as prime minister of Lithuania between 2016 and 2020. He had previously served as police commissioner, and was Minister of the Interior from 2014 to 2016. Though he was an independent politician, he was backed by the Lithuanian Farmers and Greens Union and was a member of its parliamentary group until 2022, as a result of which he became the first head of government in European history primarily backed by a green party.
Litvinism is a pseudohistorical branch of nationalism, philosophy and political current in Belarus, which bases the history of its state on the heritage of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and emphasizes the Baltic component of the Belarusian ethnic group. According to this branch of Belarusian nationalism, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania was a Slavic or Belarusian state, the medieval Lithuanians were Belarusians, and modern Lithuania is a consequence of a falsification of history. On the other hand, some Russian Litvinists refer to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania as a Slavic Russian state.
258th Lithuanian Police Battalion was a Lithuanian auxiliary police battalion formed on 27 April 1944. The unit was disbanded in Tilsit at the end of July that same year.
259th Lithuanian Police Battalion was a Lithuanian auxiliary police battalion formed in April 1944 in Prienai. It was soon disbanded in July of that same year in Tilsit. The battalion was formed from the soldiers sent by the Training Unit and the 3rd Lithuanian Construction Battalion. The 259th Battalion was the last Lithuanian Police Battalion to be formed.
Jonas Žilinskas (1888–1956) was a military officer and the first head of the interwar Lithuanian intelligence service, the Unit of Intelligence, a predecessor of the State Security Department of Lithuania.
