News

On 27 July, the results and prospects of the 2011 summer season, dynamics of visa issuance during the summer, existing problematic issues and their solutions were discussed in Palanga. The meeting of the working group was chaired by Lithuanian Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs Asta Skaisgirytė Liauškienė.

Director of Foreign Ministry’s Consular Department Vytautas Pinkus presented an overview of the summer tourist flows, trends and forecasts and activities of Lithuanian visa services in neighbouring countries. He noticed that the number of issued visas increased significantly in 2011, which largely coincided with tourist flows.

V.Pinkus said that this year there has been a particularly strong growth in the number of issued visas also in Belarus. Compared with 2010, in the first six months of the year the number of visas issued for the citizens of this neighbouring country rose 59 percent and for the citizens of Russia was up to 20 percent. During the year 2010, the Lithuanian Embassy in Minsk and Consulate General in Grodno together issued more than 107 thousand visas, and 77 thousand were issued just in the first half of this year.

In June 2011, compared with the same period in 2010, the number of visas issued by Lithuanian diplomatic representations in Belarus rose by 48 per cent, and in Russia jumped by 24 per cent.

Consul General of Lithuania to Kaliningrad Vaclavas Stankevičius spoke about issues, relating to the issuance of visas to tourists in Russia’s Kaliningrad region, which is near the resorts of Palanga and Neringa. He noted that the number of visas issued by Lithuania’s Consulate General in Kaliningrad rose by 12 per cent this year.

The meeting of the working group also discussed the situation in Palanga, Druskininkai, and other resorts of Lithuania, their needs, the readiness of hotels to accommodate the growing number of visitors, the need to improve connectivity with the rest of the world and the issues of the state border permeability.

The 5th meeting was attended by representatives from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Economy, Lithuanian State Department of Tourism under the Ministry of Economy, Migration Department under the Ministry of the Interior, Lithuanian Hotel and Restaurant Association, Lithuanian Tourism Association, Association of Resorts, and from Municipalities of Palanga, Druskininkai and Neringa.

In compliance with the order of the Minister of Foreign Affairs Audronius Ažubalis, an inter-institutional working group was established. In co-operation with the government and business partners, the working group makes decisions with regard to the enhancement of the procedures of visa issuance to tourists. The group began its activities on 21 October 2010.

This is already the second circuit session of the working group. The first one was organized on 18 February at the Embassy of Lithuania in Belarus and discussed ways for the attraction of tourists from Belarus to Lithuania.