According to Lithuania’s Seimas conservative lawmakers Vilius Semeška and Paulė Kuzmickienė, the Kaliningrad region and city’s names should be dropped.
According to LRT, the MPs have submitted a matching proposal to the State Commission on the Lithuanian Language.
The Seimas members propose changing Kaliningrad’s name to Karaliaučiaus. They claim that the current name was created as a result of Soviet aggression during World War II and is a component of Russian mythology.
The lawmakers point out that it is vital to evaluate the names and stop using foreign names in Lithuania given the ongoing Russian assault against Ukraine.
“It’s high time for us to abandon the Soviet legacy and not pollute our national language with foreign bodies. We stand in solidarity with our Polish neighbours and urge not to use imposed artificial names in the Lithuanian language,” said MP Semeška.
On May 10, the Commission on Geographical Names Standardization Outside of Poland, which is part of the country’s primary geodetic service, decided to stop using the Russian name Kaliningrad in favor of Królewiec and the Królewiecka region for the region.
