Lithuania’s parliament, the Seimas, on Tuesday rejected an opposition proposal to amend the Constitution to bar Russian and Belarusian citizens permanently residing in the country from voting or running in municipal elections.
The amendment failed to pass after 28 lawmakers voted in favour, 28 against and 14 abstained.
One of the initiative’s authors, conservative lawmaker Dalia Asanavičiūtė-Gružauskienė, said the proposal was prompted by Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine and concerns over foreign interference in democratic processes.
“We see that Russia is waging not only a conventional war in Ukraine, but is also actively interfering in elections,” she said. “Threat assessments by the State Security Department emphasise that hostile states use their diaspora to influence our democratic processes.”
According to the lawmaker, during Lithuania’s 2023 municipal elections about 21,650 foreign residents had permanent residency status. Of those, 2,476 were citizens of European Union countries, while nearly 17,000 were from non-EU states. The majority of the latter were Russian and Belarusian nationals, including more than 8,800 Russians and over 3,000 Belarusians.
As of January this year, the number of foreign residents with permanent status had risen to 24,545, with nearly 19,000 coming from non-EU countries. The number of Russian citizens declined to 8,398, while Belarusian citizens increased to about 4,000.
Asanavičiūtė-Gružauskienė said fewer than 4,300 foreign residents exercised their right to vote in the last municipal elections, arguing that national security concerns should take precedence.
Further reading
She added that visiting representatives of the Russian opposition had expressed understanding of Lithuania’s efforts to restrict participation by citizens of certain countries in democratic processes.
However, critics questioned the consistency of the proposal. Lawmaker Valius Ąžuolas said it was contradictory that a previous centre-right government had encouraged highly skilled Belarusians to come work in Lithuania, only to later consider limiting their rights.
The proposed changes sought to amend both the Constitution and the Election Code. Under the plan, only Lithuanian citizens or nationals of countries meeting Lithuania’s “European and transatlantic integration criteria” would have been eligible to vote and run in municipal elections.
Currently, Lithuanian law allows all permanent residents of a municipality, including foreign nationals with permanent residence permits, to vote and stand as candidates in local elections.
Newsletter
Every Friday morning.
