Poles in Lithuania

The Poles in Lithuania (Polish: Polacy na Litwie, Lithuanian: Lietuvos lenkai), also called Lithuanian Poles, estimated at 183,000 people in the 2021 Lithuanian census or 6.5% of Lithuania's total population, are the country's largest ethnic minority.

The first Polish people in Lithuania were mainly enslaved war captives from the Polish–Lithuanian Wars (13th–14th centuries). During the subsequent Polish–Lithuanian union until the Commonwealth's end in 1795, there was a gradual Polonization of Lithuania's upper classes, namely the nobility, which still maintained a Lithuanian identity. In addition, there was an influx of Poles into the country. Polish migration to Lithuania continued despite the Third Lithuanian Statute's attempt to prohibit Polish settlement.

During the 19th century, Polonization of Lithuanian and Belarusian peasants led to a large Polish-speaking population stretching to Daugavpils and including Vilnius by the 1890s. The rise of Polish nationalism and the Lithuanian National Revival led to irreconcilable differences between Poles and Lithuanians, that, following World War I and the rebirth of both states, escalated into the Polish–Lithuanian War, centred on Vilnius and its region. Thereafter, most, but not all, Poles living in the Lithuanian lands found themselves within the Polish borders. During World War II, the Polish population was persecuted by the USSR and Nazi Germany. Post-World War II, the borders were changed and the disputes were suppressed as the Soviet Union exercised power over both countries and a significant part of the Poles, especially the best-educated, resettled from the Lithuanian SSR to the Polish People's Republic. At the same time, many Poles relocated from nearby areas within the Byelorussian SSR to Vilnius and Vilnius region. After Lithuania regained independence, Lithuania–Poland relations were tense in the 1990s due to alleged discrimination of the Polish minority in Lithuania.

Currently, the Polish population is grouped in the Vilnius region, primarily the Vilnius and Šalčininkai districts. In the city of Vilnius alone there are more than 85,000 Poles, who make up about 15% of the Lithuanian capital's population. Most Poles in Lithuania are Roman Catholic and speak Polish, although a minority of them speak Russian or Lithuanian as their first language.