Forgotten Soviet war crime: Rainiai in Lithuania, 24-25th June, 1941

ENWar crimes do not have limitation but they are covered by forgetfulness eventually. Sometimes the forgetfulness is purposeful, when nobody wants to know anything, when it is pretended that Soviet war crimes and crimes against humanity had never happened. Sometimes it is offered not to research and forget. However, justice and responsibility for the future of nations require to know everything and to remember. Lithuania suffered two annexations (political division to Western and the remaining part in 1939-1940) and two occupations (by the USSR and Germany in 1940-1944); and in 1944-1945, the third, again Soviet, occupation returned with its forced alien rule which continued till 1990 (Russian army finally left in 1993). The first decade of this disastrous period was especially terrible. Mass killings of civilians on the basis of racial or social ("class", political) grounds and mass deportations to the invading country were the most terrible of all war crimes in Lithuania and they are far from being researched properly. There are some crimes of Soviet invading forces that are the least researched and have been even hidden, falsified and ignored until now. This publication is dedicated to one of them. When the war between Germany and the USSR broke out in June 1941 after the two years cooperation of both aggressors since they initiated the Second World War in September, 1939, German troops first of all entered Lithuania previously occupied by Soviets. Soviet invaders and their collaborators were running away in panic. In panic but also with revenge, marking their route of escape with monstrous sadistic deeds that are difficult to imagine. On the other hand, they reveal the essence of the communist terror empire of Stalin. Here is an example of thinking: since people are arrested they are guilty and cannot escape a punishment.If an officer thinks that released or escaped prisoners may become political enemies of the authorities, then the "authorities" in form of this officer destroy such potential enemies in advance: shoot them to death without trial. However, shooting to death is not enough. The decisions are also determined by the hatred coming from the depths of the understanding of own paltry and the revenge on those who are "different" because you are a villain. Documents collected in this publication witness what happened in Lithuania on the night of 24-25 June 1941 in the forest near Rainiai village not far away from Telšiai town. Among docum ents are press articles, descriptions and conclusions of medical jurisprudence, evidences of witnesses, the trial. One of the killers is still alive and unpunished after 64 years. The former officer, captain and colonel, of Soviet secret services NKVD and KGB, Petras Raslanas, once exalted and awarded by the leaders of the so-called Lithuanian SSR, who knew about his participation in the terrible crime, spends his last days quietly sheltered in Russia today. The Court of the Republic of Lithuania has not received the assistance of Russian law enforcement structures, judged ERaslanas in absentia and sentenced him to life long imprisonment for his proven crime. According to the agreement between Lithuania and Russia on legal assistance and according to the international practise, a citizen of Russia may be either extradited to an appropriate court or m ust be persecuted and serve his sentence in the country, in which he lives. However, it is not a country which punishes its war criminals. Lithuania has a number of proofs showing that. However, let people know about the crime. People say: "so th at it does not repeat". The same is said when it repeats.