Lithuania remembers deportations with Day of Hope

  • 2014-06-11
  • From wire reports, VILNIUS

On June 14, Saturday, Lithuania will mark the Day of Mourning and Hope, and the Day of Occupation and Genocide, reports ELTA. Seventy-three years ago the Soviet authorities deported over 30,000 people from Lithuania to Siberia.

This was the first wave of Soviet mass deportations in Lithuania. During the Soviet occupation Lithuania lost about 800,000 residents. Many died as the result of hunger or exhaustion or were killed by the Soviet authorities. Deportation operations were held at the same time also in Latvia, Estonia, Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova.

Based on data from the Genocide and Resistance Research Center, from 1940-1958 every third Lithuanian became the victim of the Soviet genocide and terror.

Lithuania will mark this Day by hoisting mourning flags and with many commemorating events across Vilnius.