On January 11, 2019 the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania held a public hearing on the case determining whether Constitutional provisions regarding freedom of movement of family members apply for same-sex couples. In its judgement the Constitutional Court stressed that refusal to issue a temporary residence permit to stay in Lithuania to a
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2018 was a year of exciting challenges and inspiring victories for the National LGBT rights organization LGL. Thanks to your encouragement and support, LGL was able to take many important steps aimed at improving the LGBT human rights situation in Lithuania. This year, LGL has implemented a number of successful projects. The most notable of
Anti-discrimination law The Law on Equal Treatment (Art. 6, last amended in 2017) establishes that educational, scientifc, and academic institutions are obliged to ensure equal admission, scholarship/funding and/evaluation conditions for persons regardless of their sexual orientation. More specifically, it states that educational and academic institutions and as well as other bodies carrying out the informal
On 5th December, 2018 the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania held a public hearing of the case on determining whether Constitutional provisions regarding freedom of movement of family members apply for same-sex couples. In the absence of the representative of the party concerned, the examination of the case was postponed until 3rd January,
Even though the obligation to regulate the gender change procedure was established in the version of Lithuanian Civil Code that came into force in 2001, Lithuania remains one of the few European countries where the possibility of changing personal documents and obtaining the necessary health services is not regulated at all. In 2007, the European
On 3rd-4th December, 2018 the National LGBT rights organization LGL organized an interim meeting for the project “Eliminating Transphobic, Homobophic and Biphobic Stereotypes through Better Media Representation (E.T.HO.S.)”. During the meeting the project partners discussed the next steps towards implementing the upcoming activities of the project and agreed on communication guidelines. On 3rd December, 2018
Lithuanian NGO “Christian Culture Institute”, funded by Polish Piotr Skarga fund, started to distribute homophobic leaflets urging to sign a petition to ban the upcoming Baltic Pride march to every single post box in Lithuania. The National LGBT rights organization LGL received the first messages from LGBT community members informing about the leaflets in the
Recently, Lithuanian police officers had a unique opportunity to meet with two representatives from the Stockholm Police Department: Hate Crime Unit inspector and founder of the Swedish LGBT Police Association Göran Stanton and Criminal Investigation Unit expert Jonas Jonzon. The event took place in Kaunas and is a part of “Come Forward: Empowering and Supporting
On November 8 2018, National LGBT* rights organization LGL organized a training for law enforcement officers in Kaunas, led by the Deputy Head of the Mainstream division of the Lithuanian Police Academy Vilius Velička and an expert on victomology Aliona Palujanova. Furthermore, the participants had a chance to meet an investigator within the Democracy and
On October 19, 2018, the National LGBT rights organization LGL organized a unique international seminar where participating researchers, experts and public opinion leaders had the opportunity to discuss the main challenges faced by human rights activists in Lithuania, Belarus and Ukraine. During the seminar, participants discussed the impact of hate speech, propaganda and other forms
On November 6 2018, celebrating their 20th anniversary, a well-known Lithuanian pop-rock band Skamp released a new single “Love Me Like There’s No Tomorrow” alongside a heart-warming music video. Lithuanian television refused to broadcast the music video portraying same-sex couples showing affection raising concerns over the censorship law. Ever since their career took off back in
On 24th-27th October, 2018 the representatives of the National LGBT rights organization LGL participated the 22nd ILGA-Europe annual conference. This year the theme of the conference was “Politics for Change: From Words into Action”. During the conference the changes to the Constitution of ILGA-Europe were officially approved. The conference also included elections of new ILGA-Europe