A Belarusian woman who moved to Lithuania with her family at the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has been denied an extension of her residence permit after the authorities ruled she posed a threat to national security.
Liudmila – her name is changed at the interviewee's request – received an official notice from the Migration Department stating that her frequent trips to Belarus and her former employment with the state-owned airline Belavia were grounds for concern.
This article is also available in Russian.
Migration Department's director, Evelina Gudzinskaitė, stressed that the state’s priority is national security, particularly during the war in Ukraine.
A family settled in Lithuania
Former flight attendant Liudmila left Belarus for Lithuania with her family in 2022. The move was prompted not only by a wish to be with her husband, who was working in Vilnius, but also by the outbreak of war in Ukraine. She says she could not return home because of the moral shock and a sense of complicity in the aggression.
“My husband is half-Ukrainian, and his godmother lives in Kyiv. When the war began, relatives from Ukraine started c calling us straight away. They said military equipment was coming from Belarusian territory, that they were under fire. We were devastated. It was very hard to accept that we were part of a terrible crime. It was a real blessing that we found ourselves in Lithuania,” Liudmila told LRT.lt, with tears in her eyes.
The family decided to remain in the country. Their elder child was enrolled in school, the younger in nursery. Liudmila began looking for work, but as a qualified teacher without knowledge of the language, she struggled to find a job in her profession. She eventually used her second qualification to get a job as a painter in the same company as her husband.
“I worked there for a month, and then the management changed. Problems with wages began. Eventually, I managed to find another construction company, and the Migration Department allowed me to change employer. But my husband was less fortunate – his residence permit was revoked because his employer had failed to pay taxes,” Liudmila explained.
The family tried to appeal against the decision, but without success. They lost the case in court, and her husband had to leave Lithuania. He moved to Poland on a work visa so that he could remain close to his family.
Later, the question of their younger daughter’s status arose. Under Lithuanian law, a child can obtain a residence permit only if both parents have one. A solution was found: the daughter was granted a Polish visa linked to her father’s employment.
“She lived with me, but to comply with the rules we had to traveled regularly to see my husband. It was difficult, but there was no other option,” said Liudmila.
She also spoke of an unexpected discovery – that she still held Georgian citizenship, granted in 2012 when she had been invited to represent the country in sports competitions. “I thought it had long since been annulled. But it turned out the citizenship was still valid. It helped to legalise my daughter’s status when her residence permit expired,” she recalled.
In May 2025, a year after his residence rights were revoked, her husband was issued a new permit. Liudmila was relieved to renew her own and secure one for her daughter. It seemed as though everything stabilized.
A threat to national security
But recently Liudmila received another letter from the Migration Department, this time informing her that her application to extend her residence permit had been rejected.
LRT.lt has seen the document, which stated that between 2014 and 2020 she had worked for Belavia, Belarus’s state airline. “Employment in the Belarusian state airline means that the individual must have been loyal to the Republic of Belarus and supportive of its authorities,” it read.
The letter also noted that Liudmila had crossed the Belarusian border 20 times. According to the State Security Department, granting her residence rights could allow Belarusian intelligence services to use her for their own purposes as a loyal and reliable individual.
“The Belarusian security services use their citizens living in Lithuania who previously worked in state institutions to gather intelligence and for counterintelligence purposes. Contacts with such individuals may be renewed even after they leave government service or the armed forces, especially if they live abroad or travel there frequently,” the document states.
It adds that in the event of Russian military aggression, such individuals could be deployed in special operations – spreading propaganda and disinformation, or carrying out sabotage against strategic sites. “Taking into account the overall circumstances, the current geopolitical situation and the assessment by the State Security Department, there is sufficient evidence to conclude that the individual’s interest in living and working in the Republic of Lithuania cannot be considered a priority over safeguarding national security.”
An ailing father in Belarus
Liudmila confirmed that she had been forced to return to Belarus periodically – initially to decide what to do with the pets left behind, later to renew passports for herself and her children, and to care for her seriously ill father.
“My elderly father is very unwell. In 2021, he suffered a stroke that left his health badly damaged. New problems followed: an eye operation, diabetes with unstable blood sugar – illnesses kept coming one after another. As his daughter, I cannot leave him alone – he has no one else,” she said.
Soon after deciding to settle in Lithuania, she went back to Belarus to collect her pets. Her husband remained in Lithuania, fearing possible mobilisation. She managed to bring their ageing dog, but had to leave their cat with her parents. She also had to renew travel documents for herself and her children.
The Belarusian woman pointed out that she had already been vetted by the Lithuanian authorities in 2022 and 2023, when she submitted details of her employment at Belavia. Back then the authorities had raised no objections.
“I filled in the questionnaire and stated where I had worked. At that time, I was not considered a threat. Now, two years later, they have decided otherwise. Why didn’t they refuse from the start? We wouldn’t have built our lives here,” she said, visibly bewildered.
She explained that her job at Belavia had been purely practical: “I had no work experience, and nobody wanted to hire me. Belavia did not require experience – they trained me. And the salary was good.”
Learning Lithuanian
Over the past two years, Liudmila’s family has actively integrated into Lithuanian society.
“I decided to take Lithuanian language courses and obtained an A2-level certificate. Life suddenly became brighter. At last, I began to understand everything, to fill in documents without help. We started to know where to go, what to do,” she said.
Liudmila is especially worried about her children, particularly her younger daughter, who has spent almost her entire life in Lithuania. “She goes to nursery, she has friends, beloved teachers, and activities. She doesn’t know any other life. My elder son doesn’t want to leave either. Our life here has become settled,” she said.
She is currently preparing a legal appeal. “The letter declaring me a threat to national security was like a bolt from the blue. We had just begun to breathe freely, we thought everything had finally been resolved. And now once again, we don’t know what tomorrow will bring,” she said, adding that returning to Belarus would be dangerous because of her political views and her participation in the 2020 protests.
Gudzinskaitė: National security is the priority
Evelina Gudzinskaitė, head of the Migration Department, emphasised that the state’s overriding priority was national security, particularly during the war in Ukraine. She said the decision not to renew Liudmila’s temporary residence permit was not solely linked to her former job at Belavia.
“The main argument was not her past employment at Belavia, but the fact that the individual is considered a threat to national security,” she told LRT radio.
Gudzinskaitė explained that such assessments are carried out by the State Security Department, with which the Migration Department consults.
“The State Security Department has its own criteria. These include not only past employment, but also current connections to Belarus and other circumstances. It is a complex set of factors. I cannot comment on exactly what the State Security Department considered in this case – that is their work. However, we note that past, present or ongoing links and cooperation, as well as work in structures supporting the Belarusian regime, are also relevant,” said the head of the Migration Department.
“This is one of the factors that could make a person vulnerable, for example, to Belarusian services, or perhaps indicate that they still maintain connections with Belarusian authorities,” she added.
According to Gudzinskaitė, only individuals loyal to the regime are employed in Belarusian strategic sites such as Belavia. “It is a strategic site, and only regime-loyal people work there. It cannot be otherwise,” she said.
She also pointed out that doubts arise when someone claims to fear persecution but repeatedly travels to Belarus.
“If a person says they fear the regime, yet during the validity of their residence permit has left for Belarus at least 20 times, that raises questions,” Gudzinskaitė said.
The Migration Department head noted that in this particular case the applicant “maintained regular contact with Belarusian state structures, crossed the border, obtained documents, and came under the attention of government authorities, yet always returned unhindered.” According to her, this does not confirm concerns about the applicant’s safety.
“Such a history does not inspire confidence. We always tell Belarusians and Russians that returning to Belarus is unsafe. If you fear persecution, it is dangerous to go back to your country, as you could be recruited, detained, or threatened,” she emphasised.
She also reminded that Lithuanian security is the priority during wartime:
“If there is a threat to state security, it is far more important for us as state institutions to protect Lithuania’s national interests than to take into account a foreign national’s personal circumstances – especially if they are loyal to another state, not Lithuania.
I understand that this may sound harsh, but our priority is the national security of the Lithuanian state. I believe that foreigners, when choosing to live in another country, must take into account the context that we are not living in peacetime.”
Conservative Kasčiūnas: “I trust our institutions”
Laurynas Kasčiūnas, deputy chair of the National Security and Defence Committee and the leader of the Conservative Party (TS-LKD), told LRT Radio that trust in state institutions is crucial when addressing national security issues, and he supported their decisions regarding Belarusians living in Lithuania.
“I trust our institutions. They have their own criteria, including with regard to Belarus,” Kasčiūnas said.
Earlier, he had proposed that existing residence permits be revoked if Belarusian citizens travelled to Russia or Belarus more than once within three calendar months. However, the Seimas did not approve this proposal.
According to the politician, Belarusian state-owned companies whose employees apply for residence permits in Lithuania are effectively part of the regime’s system. “People working in these companies can be influenced by the regime, even if they are not directly involved with it,” said the Conservative Party leader.
He also noted that connections to the regime could make Belarusians already living in Lithuania vulnerable, so the institutions reviewing such cases take appropriate measures.
“The institutions are doing their job. Let us allow them to do so,” Kasčiūnas said.
Franak Viačiorka, adviser to Lithuania-based Belarussian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya and head of her foreign policy office, said that any restrictions on Belarusians should be targeted and justified.
“Simply having worked for a company like Belavia or another state-owned enterprise does not mean a person is loyal to the regime. We are not talking about law enforcement officers, the Ministry of the Interior, or the military,” he told LRT.lt.
He noted that employees of Belavia took part in the 2020 protests, expressed their views, and many were dismissed or repressed. It is therefore wrong to automatically classify all such employees as “undesirable elements.”
“Each case must be considered individually. A person cannot be deemed a threat to national security simply because they worked for an airline or another state-owned company. Those who are deemed a threat, or whose residence permits are denied, can contest the decision in court. Lithuania is a rule-of-law state, and we encourage anyone who disagrees with a decision to challenge it through the Lithuanian judicial system. I know that many people have already won such cases,” Viačiorka said.
He clarified that political migrants have no opportunity to travel back to Belarus. However, many Belarusians in Lithuania are economic migrants, for whom travel does not pose a personal danger but could become a national security concern for Lithuania.
“Frequent trips are risky not because a person is breaking any rules, but because they could be taken hostage, recruited, or used to put pressure on their relatives,” Viačiorka said.
“People who travel often can indeed come under the influence of intelligence services, or, for example, be taken hostage. Their relatives may be pressured or blackmailed through them. That is why there is concern. It does not mean the individual is cooperating with the regime or breaking any laws. It is simply that these situations pose a potential security risk,” he added.
Viačiorka criticised a proposed law limiting travel.
“Lithuania is the only window to the free world. It is impossible to leave Belarus, the border with Ukraine is closed due to the war, and travel to Russia is a direct path to the FSB. Restricting travel would cut people off from their last connection to the outside world. For most Belarusians who oppose Aliaksandr Lukashenka and the war in Ukraine, this is a vital lifeline. Many also have sick relatives in Belarus. Therefore, these trips and connections are necessary, even essential,” he said.
Nevertheless, he urged Belarusians to avoid travel unless necessary, to protect both themselves and those around them.
According to Viačiorka, the number of temporary or permanent residence permits granted to Belarusians in Lithuania is declining, but he attributes this not to political refugees, but to labour migrants such as truck drivers.
“Political refugees from Belarus mostly stay because Lithuania is close to Belarus. We do not lose hope of returning home. That is our goal,” he said.
Viačiorka expressed particular concern about the Belarusian IT sector, an important economic resource. He argued that Lithuania has a vested interest, particularly economically, in keeping businesses, including IT specialists, in the country.
“Belarusian IT workers who opposed Lukashenka and faced repression have moved to Lithuania, paying millions of euros into the Lithuanian budget. This is a significant intellectual and economic resource, which is undoubtedly beneficial for Lithuania to retain. The fact that some companies are now considering relocating elsewhere is worrying, but this is more linked to the information environment than to changes in legislation,” he said.
He added that the Belarusian regime deliberately tries to create the impression that Belarusians in Lithuania are unwelcome. Although no laws have been tightened, the information space fosters the sense that attitudes towards Belarusians are deteriorating, which may encourage IT specialists to move to other countries.
Statistics on residence permit refusals
According to Evelina Gudzinskaitė, head of the Migration Department, since June 2025, 121 residence permit applications by Belarusians have been refused due to national security concerns, 303 permits have not been renewed, and 97 already-issued permits have been revoked.
If a permit is revoked, the individual is given 14 days to leave voluntarily, and in some cases, more time is granted under an agreement.
“We give two weeks, and then we arrange how long it will take to complete the formalities,” Gudzinskaitė concluded.
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