Lithuania's investigation launched into alleged torture by Belarusian security officers sets a good precedent, the country's acting Foreign Minister Linas Linkevičius said on Wednesday.
"I believe that other countries should do the same," Linkevičius told BNS, adding it will also make the perpetrators consider their actions.
"It is very important that prosecution be carried out," he said. "The UN Human Rights Council is gathering evidence [and] the European Parliament's resolution is calling on the EU to participate actively in the creation of a centre that could collect legal evidence."
Read more: Lithuanian prosecutors launch probe into regime violence in Belarus
A Belarusian citizen, Maksim Khoroshin, turned to Lithuanian prosecutors in November, claiming that he was brutally beaten by security forces in Minsk on October 13.
He said he still received threatening phone calls after fleeing to Vilnius.
Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, the main Belarusian opposition leader, welcomed the investigation.
“We encourage all other countries to follow this initiative of the Lithuanian prosecutor and start investigating crimes against humanity of the regime,” she added. “Not a single case should be forgotten and every case should be investigated.”
Read more: Tikhanovskaya urges Europe to follow Lithuania in probing torture in Belarus
In November, Alexander Dobrovolsky from Tikhanovskaya’s staff in Lithuania said they would seek to coordinate similar complaints filed by torture victims in other European countries.
Tikhanovskaya, the opposition frontrunner against Alexander Lukasheko, was forced to flee to Vilnius several days after the rigged August 9 presidential election.
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