Lithuanian culture minister Dr. Mindaugas Kvietkauskas has met with YIVO director Jonathan Brent and YIVO head of archives Dr. Stefanie Halpern. In the meeting they discussed the implementation of YIVO’s Vilna project, a seven-year-long international effort to preserve, digitize and connect the pre-war YIVO archives in New York and Vilnius. The project aims at recreating the Strashun Library, one of the largest Jewish collections in Europe before the Holocaust.

The Lithuanian side expressed the hope that next year, when the Baltic country marks the Year of the Vilna Gaon and Litvak History, YIVO would loan the pinkas of the Vilna Gaon shul, a book of statistics kept by the Jewish community which is considered one of the most important documents testifying to the life and history of the Vilnius Jewish community.

Full story in Lithuanian on the Lithuanian Culture Ministry webpage here.