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6. Aug 2009|10:47 |
Across from the Lithuanian-Belarusian border in Medininkai, one will pass a monument for the victims of the massacre - seven white marble crosses poised on a massive black pedestal. The Soviets killed seven Lithuanian customs agents and policemen there on July 31,1991. Eighteen years ago, on July 31, customs officials Antanas Musteikis, Stanislovas Orlavicius, and Ricardas Rabavicius, policemen Mindaugas Balavakas, Algimantas Juozakas, Juozas Janonis and Algirdas Kazlauskas were killed by Soviet commandos during what is remembered as the Medininkai massacre.
However, this tragic event was one stop shy of a complete massacre. The invaders estimated they had eight victims but they had not expected Tomas Sernas, a customs official, to remain alive. He was injured severely but he survived. Sernas is the only witness to the murder of seven people. "It was a nice summer night of July 31,1991. At half past three, people from the Soviet special forc¬es, called OMON [Russian abbreviation for the Special Purpose Mili¬tia Squad], came armed with guns and demanded that everybody lay on the floor so they could shoot all eight of us in the head," Sernas told The Baltic Times. At the time, the Lithuanian customs officials were unarmed. Although the Lithuanian police¬men had guns, they had a standing order from the Lithuanian government not to use them from fear that it might provoke a Soviet army at¬tack on Lithuania. The Lithuanian policemen who were with the customs officials had the right only to fire a warning shot into the air. In those days, it was a heroic act to go to work at a Lithuanian customs post. Before that night other Lithuanian customs stations were attacked by OMON on several occasions - customs officials were beaten, stations were blown up, but the Soviets were not committing murders at the border stations.
The events of July 31 at Medininkai were different and, altogether, beyond fiction for Sernas - on Aug. 1 he was to be married. The wedding with his fiancee Rasa took place two years later.
Sernas had perforating wounds in both cerebral hemispheres. Fragments of bones were taken out of his head. OMON left him because they thought he was dead. He was un¬conscious, treated in Kaunas clinics and later in Germany Only six months after the massacre, Sernas was allowed visits from officials, his parents and his fiancee. Now Sernas is a Lutheran priest. He walks with difficulty because of bad coordination. Sernas took part in the Medininkai massacre commemoration this year sitting in a wheelchair. Although he slightly stutters after that tragic event, he is also the main witness at the Medininkai massacre related trial which now is going on in Vilnius.
According to Sernas and the Lithuanian Prosecutor General's Office statements at the court, the massacre was committed by Riga's OMON with the help of Vilnius' OMON (both units then remained loyal to Moscow). After Lithuania proclaimed re-establishment of its independence on March 11, 1990, special Soviet militia forces began terrorist acts and provocations.
The Lithuanian prosecutors say that the massacre was committed by the special terrorist group Delta. Although it was nominally a part of Riga's OMON, it received orders directly from Moscow.
The suspect in the Vilnius court trial is Latvian citizen Konstantin Mikhailov (in 1991, his surname was Nikulin), extradited by Latvia, he is a 40-year old former member of the Delta group in Riga's OMON. Mikhailov confirms that he, with the Delta group, was in Lithuania on July 31, 1991, but he denies his and Delta's participation in the massacre. Ironically, although Mikhailov is kept in the Lukiskes Prison in Vilnius, he was a candidate to the European Parliament (EP) on a pro-Russian Latvia's party list during the recent EP election, which took place this summer on June 7.
Prosecutors say that an investigation with regard to other suspects, also former OMON members - unit chief Cheslav Mlynik and militiamen Andrey Laktyonov and Alexander Ryzhov - have been separated and are in process. All three of them are in Russia. Ryzhov is now in prison for a crime not related with the Medininkai massacre.
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