Vilnius, September 25, BNS– The Lithuanian Seimas Sunday hosted a conference to mark the Jewish Genocide Memorial Day.

The conference called “They Rescued Jews, They Rescued Lithuania’s Honor” was organized by the Lithuanian Jewish Community, the parliament’s press service said.

Those taking part in the conference included Faina Kukliansky, chairwoman of the Lithuanian Jewish Community, Andrew Baker, director of International Jewish Affairs for the American Jewish Committee, and Howard Solomon, chargé d’affaires ad interim at the US embassy in Vilnius.

The program includes presentations by historian Alvydas Nikzentaitis on the life of Jews in Lithuania, Joachim Tauber of the University of Hamburg on “Hitler, Stalin and Anti-Semitism in Lithuania in 1939-1940” and historian Algimantas Kasparavicius on “Lithuanian Political Illusions, the ‘Policy’ of the Provisional Government of Lithuania and the Beginning of the Holocaust in Lithuania.”

Lithuania has been marking Jewish Genocide Memorial Day since 1994 to commemorate the liquidation of the Vilnius ghetto on September 23, 1943.

The Nazis assisted by Lithuanian collaborators massacred more than 90 percent of the Lithuanian pre-war Jewish population of around 208,000 during World War II.

The Israel-based Yad Vashem center of Holocaust studies has recognized more than 800 Lithuanians as Righteous among the Nations for risking their lives to rescue Jews from the genocide.