The Associated Press
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| People marking Thursday’s holiday with a 200-meter flag in Vilnius. |
MAISIAGALA, Lithuania — Poland and Lithuania are bonded by history, culture and Catholic faith but deeply divided over the letter w.
Used a lot in Polish, the letter doesn't exist in Lithuanian. That and other spelling differences are irritating Lithuania's Polish minority, who demand the right to spell their names in Polish in passports and other documents.
This linguistic row may seem trivial, but in recent months other disagreements have helped escalate it to a full-blown diplomatic standoff. Poland's ambassador was summoned to the Foreign Ministry in Lithuania's capital, Vilnius, and sharp statements have been made by both governments.
In the latest snub, top Polish officials declined invitations to commemorations Thursday honoring the victims of a bloody Soviet crackdown on Lithuania's independence movement 20 years ago.
Since independence in 1991, successive Lithuanian governments have promised to give the country's 200,000 Polish-speakers — representing 6 percent of the population — more freedom to use their native language, but little has happened.