Ryanair, Europe's favourite low fares airline, on January 3rd confirmed that from Sunday 5th January it will cut its standard airport bag fees from €60/£60 to €30/£30 at the bag drop desk, and from €60/£60 to €50/£50 at the boarding gate, bringing Ryanair's bag fees into line with competitor airlines standard airport bag fees, informs BC Elina Hakkarainen from Ryanair.

Social Support Information System for Families (www.spis.lt) which was developed by the Ministry of Social Security and Labour was recently launched in Lithuania. Residents will no longer have to visit municipalities but will be able to apply for as much as 26 services online.

Deputy Minister of Transport and Communications of the Republic of Lithuania as well as Chairman of the Board of JSC Lithuanian Railways Saulius Girdauskas together with Deputy General Director of JSC Lithuanian Railways Albertas Simenas and Deputy Head of Belarusian Railways Valeriy Stromuk signed an agreement on cooperation on financing the improvement project on 'High-speed railway passenger service between Minsk and Vilnius' with funds allocated in The Latvia, Lithuania and Belarus Cross Border Cooperation Program within the European Neighborhood and Partnership Instrument, the Transport and Communications Ministry of Lithuania informed BC.

President Dalia Grybauskaitė presented prizes to laureates of the Global Lithuanian Awards. 43 nominees from 13 countries were proposed for awards for promoting Lithuania's name in the spheres of culture, sport, science and business.

On January 3 Belgium’s air contingent handed over NATO’s mission of ensuring security in the airspace of the Baltic States to air personnel of the United States of America operating four F-15 C Eagle fighter-jets at a formal changeover ceremony at Šiauliai Air Base of the Lithuanian Air Force.

After the end of the calendar year, the Ministry of Environment counted the number of blocks of flat being participating in the second stage of renovation: renovation works have begun for 194 blocks of flats, in part of them renovation is completed.

Corporate income tax relief that entered into effect in 2014 in Lithuania is expected to increase the competitiveness of country's film production and to attract foreign film makers.

SAS Group revenue during the last fiscal year (November 2012 - October 2013) was MSEK 42,2, i.e. 0,5 % less than during the previous financial year. In the meantime, after major cost cuttings SAS EBIT margin increased to 3.3% (during the previous year it was -1.6%). Yet another positive result of the last year is Scandinavian Airlines traffic increase by 3.8%.

During the Christmas charity evening which was organized in Kaunas city Hall on Thursday, people donated a great sum of money.

The construction of the European railway line Rail Baltica has already disturbed the lives of the residents of Vingyte village (Kaunas district). As soon as 2014 begins, the situation will be even worse because the builders are planning to reconstruct the railway's crossover and to close the driveway for a period of time.