REFUGEE PROJECT

The Lithuanian Red Cross, Kaunas and Odense cities implement the project "Kaunas-Odense refugee project", financed by Phare Small Project Facility.

Lithuania encountered refugee problems in the last decade, after regaining of independence. Refugees from Pakistan, Afghanistan, India and other countries started to cross Lithuania. Besides, during the recent war in Chechnya, many Chechens come to Lithuania.

The Lithuania Government approved the program of social integration of refugees while creating favourable conditions for the adaptation of those who received the refugee status following the Government decisions on the Refugee Status in the Republic of Lithuania and on the Implementation Means of the Government Activities of 1997-2000. Social Care and Employment Ministry, Education and Science Ministry, Council of Refugee Affairs and Municipalities are supposed to take care of the integration of refugees according to this program. Within the integration process people are involved into the Lithuanian society with the possibility to live independently.

Kaunas Municipality, as well as other Lithuanian municipalities, is not prepared for this process. The city neither has an integral system how to integrate or help to integrate the persons who received the refugee status into the society, nor specialists educated for this task. Thus, such a situation provided an idea to prepare a project in this field. The Project partner is Odense City, which was invited for such an activity basing on the facts that Denmark is a country who receives around ten thousend new refugees each year, and about ten prcents of all inhabitants in Odense City are refugees. Thus this city has a log-lasting practice and experience in the field of social integration of refugees.

The tasks and objectives of the project are to receive consultations from Odense experts regarding the refugee integration on a local level, train social workers how to work with refugees, share the experience of the refugee integration in both our countries specially focusing on specific work with refugees from different countries and create the refugee social integration system.

The project started in May 2001 and is expected to be complete next spring.