"From early January, foreigner nationals will no longer have to come to Lithuania to obtain a residence permit, but will be able to apply for one while abroad," she told reporters.
According to the director, the service will be provided in the 34 countries by VFS Global, which has been selected through a public procurement process. The company is providing similar services to many governments and diplomatic missions worldwide.
The outsourcing service provider will be authorized to provide information on the procedure for issuing temporary residence permits, to receive applications and the necessary documents, to collect personal and biometric data, and to send the data to the Migration Department.
In all cases, decisions on whether or not to issue a temporary residence permit will be made by the department's specialists. They will have one to three months to process an application and decide whether to grant it.
"This will help all employers to bring in labor from abroad," Gudzinskaite said.
Currently, foreign nationals have to come to Lithuania and fill in the paperwork in order to obtain a residence permit in the country.
The service will be available in the VFS Global offices in the following countries: Albania, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Azerbaijan, Brazil, Canada, Georgia, India, Israel, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Libya, Malaysia, Moldova, Nepal, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, the United States, Uzbekistan and Venezuela.