Other events in Baltic States

Lithuania aims to honor the memory of Dutch honorary consul Jan Zwartendijk who worked in Kaunas in the interwar period, the Lithuanian Foreign Ministry informed LETA/BNS.

On Wednesday, Foreign Vice-Minister Mantvydas Bekesius met with Zwartendijk's children Robert and Edith, as well as prominent Dutch writer Jan Brokken and Dutch Ambassador to Lithuania Bert van der Lingen.

At the meeting, the participants discussed tribute to Zwartendijk and a monument in Lithuania's second-largest city Kaunas.

Zwartendijk was appointed as Dutch company Philips Electric's representative in Lithuania in May of 1940, shortly after the Dutch capitulation against the Nazi Germany.

After the start of the Soviet occupation in June of that year, Jews who were in the country started searching for ways to flee Lithuania in the face of imminent threat. Zwartendijk started issuing the so-called Curacao visas – he made an entry in foreigners' passports that they were headed to the Dutch territory overseas.

The entry allowed Japan's consul in Kaunas Chiune Sugihara to issue transit Japanese visas, which saved lives of a few thousand Jews.