The prosecutor at the Vilnius District Office of Prosecutor has decided not to begin a pre-trial investigation of statements made by member of parliament Valdas Rakutis in his article “International Holocaust Day and Historical Memory.” The prosecutor said the decision was made based on the lack of an act of a criminal nature, a press release said.

The decision not to initiate a pre-trial investigation was made following a statement from the chairwoman of the Lithuanian Jewish Community which indicated historian and MP Rakutis published the article on International Holocaust Remembrance Day on an internet site which allegedly incited hatred against Jews and their people, and possibly engaged in Holocaust denial.

The informant asked the prosecutor to consider whether or not the statements made in the article constituted the criminal act defined in article 170, part 2 of the Lithuanian criminal code, “incitement against any national, racial, ethnic, religious or other kind of group of people,” and article 170-2, part 1, “public approval for international crimes, crimes committed by the USSR and Nazi Germany against the Republic of Lithuania or residents thereof, and their denial or gross trivialization.”

The decision to decline beginning a pre-trial investigation stated the criminal acts defined in article 170, part 2, and article 170-2, part 1, can only be committed by direct intention.

The information gathered during the investigation of the complaint, however, led to the conclusion, the prosecutor decided, that the historian Rakutis in preparing his article published on January 27 had no intention of inciting a negative public reaction against people of Jewish ethnicity, did not seek to incite hatred and discord, and neither did he intentionally and publicly deny the Holocaust.

It goes on: “In the article, he presented a list of historical facts, examined the reasons for the Holocaust and expressed his opinion in a specific way, and sought to initiate discussion for judging this phenomenon.”

Based on the information collected, the prosecutor determined there was no intentionality in Rakutis’s actions, and thus without a prerequisite factor for the commission of a criminal act, in this case direct intention, a pre-trial investigation could not be launched.

This decision by the prosecutor may be applied in the manner prescribed by law before a pre-trial investigation judge.

Full article in Lithuanian here.