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This article is about the particular significance of the year 2010 to Lithuania and its people.
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| See also: | Other events of 2010 | ||||
This article is about the particular significance of the year 2010 to Lithuania and its people.
Lithuania, officially the Republic of Lithuania, is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea. It shares land borders with Latvia to the north, Belarus to the east and south, Poland to the south, and Russia to the southwest. Lithuania covers an area of 65,300 km2 (25,200 sq mi), with a population of 2.8 million. Its capital and largest city is Vilnius; other major cities are Kaunas and Klaipėda. Lithuanians belong to the ethno-linguistic group of the Balts and speak Lithuanian, one of only a few living Baltic languages.
The history of Lithuania dates back to settlements founded many thousands of years ago, but the first written record of the name for the country dates back to 1009 AD. Lithuanians, one of the Baltic peoples, later conquered neighboring lands and established the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in the 13th century. The Grand Duchy was a successful and lasting warrior state. It remained fiercely independent and was one of the last areas of Europe to adopt Christianity. A formidable power, it became the largest state in Europe in the 15th century through the conquest of large groups of East Slavs who resided in Ruthenia. In 1385, the Grand Duchy formed a dynastic union with Poland through the Union of Krewo. Later, the Union of Lublin (1569) created the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth that lasted until 1795, when the last of the Partitions of Poland erased both Lithuania and Poland from the political map. After the dissolution, Lithuanians lived under the rule of the Russian Empire until the 20th century, although the were several major rebellions, especially in 1830–1831 and 1863.
Politics of Lithuania takes place in a framework of a unitary semi-presidential representative democratic republic, whereby the President of Lithuania is the head of state and the Prime Minister of Lithuania is the head of government, and of a multi-party system.
Algirdas Mykolas Brazauskas was the first President of a newly independent post-Soviet Lithuania from 1993 to 1998 and Prime Minister from 2001 to 2006.
The coat of arms of Lithuania, consisting of an armour-clad knight on horseback holding a sword and shield, is also known as Vytis. It is recognized as the official coat of arms of Lithuania since the early 15th century and is also known in other Lithuanian language names as Waikymas, Pagaunė or as Pogonia, Pogoń, Погоня in the Polish, Belarusian and Ruthenian languages. Vytis should be translated as Chase, Pursuer, Knight or Horseman, similar to the Slavic word Витязь. Historically – raitas senovės karžygys or in heraldry – raitas valdovas. The coat of arms of Lithuania is one of the oldest national coats of arms in Europe.
Sportin Lithuania is governed by the Physical Education and Sports Department following the country's independence from the Soviet Union in 1990. The Lithuanian government established the department to manage physical education in the schools and sports administration in the country. Over the next few years, Lithuanian sports organizations established membership in international governing bodies. Lithuania participated in the Winter Olympics in Albertville and has participated in every Winter and Summer Olympics since.
Futbolo klubas Žalgiris, commonly known as FK Žalgiris, Žalgiris Vilnius or simply Žalgiris is a Lithuanian professional football club based in Vilnius. The club competes in the A Lyga, the top flight of Lithuanian football. The club was founded as Dinamo in 1947. The club's name commemorates the victorious Battle of Žalgiris. Žalgiris has featured many Lithuanian football legends during their history, including Arminas Narbekovas, Valdas Ivanauskas, Edgaras Jankauskas and Deividas Šemberas. They have won the Lithuanian Championship 8 times, the Lithuanian Football Cup 12 times and the Lithuanian Supercup 7 times.
The January Events, commonly referred to as Bloody Sunday, took place in Lithuania on January 11–13 1991 in the aftermath of the Act of the Re-Establishment of the State of Lithuania. As a result of Soviet military actions, 14 civilians were killed and over 1100 were injured. The events were centered in its capital, Vilnius, along with related actions in its suburbs and in the cities of Alytus, Šiauliai, Varėna, and Kaunas.
Gediminas Kirkilas is a Lithuanian politician who was Prime Minister of Lithuania from 2006 to 2008.
Antakalnis is an eldership in the Vilnius city municipality, Lithuania. Antakalnis is one of the oldest, and largest historical suburbs of Vilnius City. It is in the eastern section of Vilnius, along the left bank of the Neris River, with the river running along the whole western side of the district. The Antakalnis eldership is the second-largest in Vilnius, with an area of 77.2 km2 (29.8 sq mi).
The 1926 Lithuanian coup d'état was a military coup d'état in Lithuania that resulted in the replacement of the democratically elected government with a conservative authoritarian government led by Antanas Smetona. The coup took place on 17 December 1926 and was largely organized by the military; Smetona's role remains the subject of debate. The coup brought the Lithuanian Nationalist Union, the most conservative party at the time, to power. Before 1926, it had been a fairly new and insignificant nationalistic party: in 1926, its membership numbered about 2,000 and it had won only three seats in the parliamentary elections. The Lithuanian Christian Democratic Party, the largest party in the Seimas at the time, collaborated with the military and provided constitutional legitimacy to the coup, but did not accept any major posts in the new government and withdrew in May 1927. After the military handed power over to the civilian government, it ceased playing a direct role in political life.
Presidential elections were held in Lithuania on 17 May 2009. A run-off would have been held on 7 June 2009, but was not necessary as Dalia Grybauskaitė was elected with 69 percent of the vote, with voter turnout just over the 50% threshold for the result to be validated. She took office on 12 July as the country's first female president.
Parliamentary elections were held in Lithuania on 8 October 2000. All 141 seats in the Seimas were up for election, 71 of them in single-seat constituencies based on first-past-the-post voting; the remaining 70, in a nationwide constituency based on proportional representation. Altogether, around 700 candidates competed in the single-seat constituencies, while over 1,100 candidates were included in the electoral lists for the nationwide constituency.
Airinė Palšytė is a Lithuanian high jumper. She won the gold medal at the 2017 European Indoor Championships.
This article is about the particular significance of the year 2011 to Lithuania and its people.
BC Prienai, also known by the sponsor name Labas Gas is a professional basketball club based in Prienai, Lithuania. They play domestically in Lithuanian Basketball League every year. During the 2008–09 season, then called Rūdupis they became the champion of the NKL and won the challenge match for a slot in the LKL. In their debut LKL season Rūdupis took seventh place, while next two seasons brought BC Prienai two bronze LKL medals. BC Prienai played in EuroCup 2011–12 with moderate success; the team won 3 games out of 6, but nonetheless failed to qualify for the next stage. More recently, the team has become a strong competitor in domestic tournaments, more than once upsetting teams such as Žalgiris Kaunas and Lietuvos rytas Vilnius. In December 2017, in a highly publicized move, Vytautas signed American basketball players and brothers LaMelo and LiAngelo Ball.
Events in the year 2015 in Lithuania.
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