Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda has proposed stricter rules on migration, BNS reports. Under the proposal, labour migrants would be required to leave Lithuania for at least six months after every two years of work. Also, the labour migrant quota would include not only new migrants but also those already in Lithuania. Skirmantas Bikelis, senior research fellow at the Institute of Law of the Lithuanian Centre for Social Sciences, warned that the proposal could block family reunification, preclude permanent residency, and halve the labour immigration quota, LRT reported. Meanwhile, Nauseda’s chief national security adviser, Deividas Matulionis, argued that the number of foreigners in Lithuania placed pressure on integration systems and contributed to social tension, LRT reported. A survey by Diversity Development Group showed that only around 50% of Lithuanians would accept labour migrants from outside the EU. Currently, around 220,000 foreigners reside in Lithuania, which is 7.7% of the population.
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