The Position of Russian-Speakers Minorities in the Baltic States with the Accent on the Situation in Lithuania

This Diploma paper The Position of Russian- speakers minorities in The Baltic states with the accent on the situation in Lithuania concerns about the position and actual problems of Russian- speakers minority in Lithuania and I try to compare it with different situation of Russian-speakers minorities in neighbouring Latvia and Estonia. When The Baltic states proclaimed the independence at the beginning of 1990's, after The collapse of The Soviet Union, only Lithuania decided to grant its citizenship to all applicants. This political decision has helped a lot to decrease a possibility of interethnic conflict. Diploma paper consists of three parts. In the first part you can find introduction to The ethnic minorities question and the theory of ethnicity. The second part is about the history of The Russian-speakers minority in The Baltic states, especially in Lithuania from the medieval ages to the end of The Soviet Union. The third part of my Diploma paper is fully concerning about the situation and actual problems of Russian-speakers minority in Lithuania and I try to compare it with much more complicated situation in Latvia and Estonia thanks to different demographic structure of societies and state national minorities policies. The last chapter describes the influence of The Russian-speakers minority issue..