Education and Science, EU – Baltic States, Legislation, Lithuania, Society, Strike

Whereas according to police, attendance was from 800 to 1,000.

During the rally, protesters distributed a petition, which was also submitted to Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevicius. In it, they said to be opposing amendments related to payment, cuts of severance pay, notice periods and social guarantees of working parents as well as introduction of fixed-term employment contracts for jobs of permanent nature.

The protesters also demanded to revise funding of schools, to reintroduce the Law on Ethnic Minorities that was in effect up to 2010 and to accelerate land restitution.

Chairwoman of LLRA political group in the Seimas, Rita Tamasuniene, warned that more such rallies will be held unless the Government takes action.

First Deputy Chancellor of the Government, Rimantas Vaitkus, who met with the protesters, called the rally LLRA's political campaign and stressed that Lithuania has created the best conditions for the Polish minority to learn in the Polish language starting from kindergartens to very graduation of universities.

"The problems that LLRA has raised concerning low wages of teachers and inaccuracies while implementing the reform of schools concern other schools as well. () Such is the demographic situation which forces us to carry out the reform of schools, but this does not mean that the Lithuanian state has something against schools of ethnic minorities," Vaitkus told journalists.

One of the organisers of the protest, Chairwoman of the Forum of Parents of Polish Schools in Vilnius, Danuta Narbut, said that the rally was attended by teachers from various schools, schoolchildren and their parents as well as cultural and social employees. When asked by journalists why the issued petition claimed that the protest was attended by 4,000 people when the permit was granted for 2,000, Narbut said that it was not her job to count the number of people.

Neither Narbut nor Tamasuniene revealed if LLRA had financially contributed to organising the rally. Tamasuniene told to ask the party's leadership. Chairman of LLRA, Valdemar Tomasevski, who attended the rally refused to talk to the media.