May 26, 2020

To:

Viktoras Pranckietis, speaker of parliament, pirmininko.sekretoriatas@lrs.lt

Dainis Gaižauskas, chairman, National Security and Defense Committee, Dainius.Gaizauskas@lrs.lt

Request to Investigate Video

For at least several days now there has been a video posted to youtube in which two members vote by raising their hands in the manner done in the Third Reich during a meeting of the Lithuanian parliament’s National Security and Defense Committee. The video is accompanied by an audio track in which a member of parliament seems to warn these two the meeting is being filmed.

The video appears under the title “Naciai LR Seime” [Nazis in the Parliament of the Republic of Lithuania] with the note it comes from the May 20, 2020, meeting of this committee.

This video recording has caused great concern in the international arena and raises suspicions anti-Semitic sentiment is growing rapidly in Lithuania. It is becoming dangerous for Jews to live here because these sorts of salutes were used by the Nazis and their collaborators (who were also Nazis) when the Jews were exterminated in Lithuania and Europe.

The Lithuanian Jewish Community requests an inquiry into whether the two MPs did vote with a “sieg heil” salute and whether the other MP really did warn them as heard in the audio, and to report the results of this investigation to the LJC.

Comments under the youtube posting name one of the MPs who apparently gave the Nazi salute as Audrys Šimas, a member of the Peasants and Green Union faction in parliament.

The video seems to show another MP, identified as Arūnas Gumuliauskas, returning the salute. The MP warning the two not to do that because the meeting was being filmed, according to the audio track, was conservative Laurynas Kasčiūnas.

Please check this information and make a determination on the identity of the MPs involved.

Whether the recording is real or fake, it does harm to the reputation of the Lithuanian parliament and moreover the entire country. It has caused concern and anger among Jews in Lithuania and around the world.

We do not find it credible that in Lithuania only Jews have seen this video nor that members of parliament and law enforcement institutions whose job it is to respond have not seen it. We very much hope an investigation is already underway.

The video is posted here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZATZiDvSdI

Faina Kukliansky, chairwoman
Lithuanian Jewish Community