Two Lithuanian conservative lawmakers have called for an appeal to the United Nations Human Rights Committee and the imposition of sanctions following the demolition of a memorial complex dedicated to victims of Stalinist repression in the Russian city of Tomsk earlier this month.
Deputy Speaker of the Seimas Radvilė Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė and Paulė Kuzmickienė, deputy chair of the Commission for Freedom Struggles and State Historical Memory, addressed the foreign and justice ministers after the complex – which included a Lithuanian-funded memorial, as well as monuments to Estonian, Latvian, Polish and other victims of mass deportations – was dismantled on April 19.
"Russia's consistent actions are more than a matter of heritage preservation. We view this as part of a deliberate policy to rehabilitate Stalinist crimes and base imperialist goals on distorted history. Stalinism killed tens of millions of people, destroyed lives, and sought to deny the existence of independent states," Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė said.
The lawmakers proposed that ministers initiate a formal appeal to the UN Human Rights Committee over what they described as the systematic destruction of the memory of repression victims and the deliberate distortion of history.
They also urged a coordinated regional response, calling on countries that oppose the erasure of European historical memory to act together, and asked ministers to assess the possibility of placing those responsible on sanctions lists.
Further proposals include strengthening international cooperation on the issue and digitising memorial sites by marking them on platforms such as Google Maps – an effort to preserve a record of sites that may no longer physically exist.
The Lithuanian Foreign Ministry has already summoned Russia's chargé d'affaires in Vilnius to protest the demolition. Lithuania, the Baltic states and Poland have also sent a joint letter to the Russian Foreign Ministry.
The Tomsk memorial, created by sculptor Tadas Gutauskas, was erected in 2016 using Lithuanian state funds.
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