VILNIUS - Lithuania's Parliament amended the country's Lustration Law on April 17 extending a ban on employment in public service positions to include former KGB reserve officers. The amendments, which were debated in Parliament for almost a year, were supported by 56 lawmakers in the 141-member legislature, with only three voting against and 13 abstaining
The law had previously provided for a ban only on regular officers of the well-entrenched Soviet organization, while officers placed on the KGB's reserve list were not subject to the ban.
Adopted in 1999, the law prohibited former KGB officers from employment in the government, State Security Department, state auditor's office, Lithuanian Army and diplomatic service for 10 years. Former KGB officers were also barred from being deputy ministers or prosecutors, and from heading public institutions, including state-owned schools.
KGB reserve officers continue to be exempt from another law, which requires people who collaborated with the KGB to confess the fact.
It is estimated that some 4,500 Lithuanians collaborated with the KGB in some way during the 50 years of Lithuania's Soviet occupation. But only 1,500 confessed when the law was adopted. The Lustration Comission has since announced the names of a few dozen who had not confessed as prescribed by the law. The names of those who confessed would otherwise be kept confidential unless they chose to run for Parliament or become public officials.
The April 17 amendments were mainly aimed at the current head of Lithuania's State Security Department Arvydas Pocius and former foreign minister and current Member of Parliament Antanas Valionis.
The two were under investigation by a special parliamentary commission in 2005 when Lithuanian media reported that both were on a list of KGB officers in the 1980s.
The commission confirmed that Pocius and Valionis were on the list but said that this fact did not pose a threat to national security.
Opposition lawmakers then initiated the amendments to the Lustration law, but the change was delayed several times and was repeatedly sent back for corrections.
To come into force the law has to be signed by President Valdas Adamkus who has been supportive of Pocius and especially of Valionis. Adamkus also has the right to veto the legislation, but his spokesperson Rita Grumadaite on April 17 refused to comment on the president's position.
"The President first wants to see the amendments and only then will he make the decision," Grumadaite told journalists.
If signed by the president, the law would destroy Valionis' hopes to become an ambassador in Argentina, a position he has been angling for.
For Pocius, who was urged to step down by lawmakers last year but survived in a surprise vote in Parliament in March, the new law leaves almost no chance to retain his position.
