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Friday, 26.04.2024, 12:02
Initiative unveiled to name both victims and killers at mass Jewish graves in Lithuania
It is proposed to put up special information boards at sites of mass Jewish
graves in Lithuania to display both the names of those killed and as detailed
information as possible about their executioners, informs LETA/BNS.
The initiative was unveiled on Thursday by Eugenijus Jovaisa, chairman of
the Seimas Committee on Education and Science.
Jovaisa says that the idea was raised by Israel's ambassador to Lithuania,
Amir Maimon, a year ago and has been cherished for some time now by the
Genocide and Resistance Research Center of Lithuania (LGGRTC), but adds that
realizing it would require increasing funding for the center.
According to the chairman, currently there are only two mass Jewish grave
sites in Lithuania where one can read the names of those killed. Another such
board has just been put up in Leipalingis, a small town in the southern part of
the country, and will be formally unveiled on Friday.
The lawmaker said that around 86,000 euros would be needed annually for
performing research and putting up boards that would not only tell visitors
about the Holocaust and the killings that took place in the area, but would
also provide the names of the victims and their age and concrete information
about their killers.
LGGRTC Director Terese Birute Burauskaite said that the center had long ago
set itself the goal of ensuring that the victims of the both Nazi and Soviet
regimes "are not nameless".
According to the director, the proposed boards would also inform visitors
about the life of local Jewish communities before World War Two and the
attitude of the local population towards the Holocaust.
"Our aim is to show what happened as thoroughly and comprehensively as
possible. We need everything that is available today: all documents and witness
testimonies. If we committed ourselves only to providing a list of all victims,
we could name around 80 percent of them. But for us it is very important to
show all these processes and their participants so that history is present in
each of these places," Burauskaite told reporters.
LGGRTC would be helped by the Vilnius Gaon Jewish State Museum and others
who "see the meaning and necessity" of such work, she said.
According to LGGRTC data, there are about 200 mass Jewish grave sites in
Lithuania.
About 90 percent of the Lithuanian pre-war Jewish population of over
200,000 died during the Holocaust. Around 3,000 Jews currently live in the
country.