VILNIUS - Lithuanian prosecutors have launched two pretrial investigations related to an anti-discrimination rally that had been scheduled to take place May 26 but was banned by Vilnius authorities. "The Special Investigation Department of the Prosecutor General's Office has started two separate investigations into discrimination against homosexual people and the instigation of hatred against them," Aurelija Juodyte, spokeswoman for Prosecutor General's Office, told The Baltic Times on June 4.
"One investigation is related to a Web site and comments made on it. Another will look at leaflets and advertisements distributed in Vilnius directed against the homosexual community," Juodyte added.
Both the Web site and leaflets were related to the anti-discrimination rally, which was backed by the EU, but banned by the Vilnius city government over fears that the event could spark unrest.
One of the arguments for the ban was an Internet campaign calling on people to resist the plans of the Lithuanian homosexual community to hoist a rainbow flag during the event.
"Let us resist the rainbow colors," said the Web site. It also called on "everybody who thinks that homosexuals, pedophiles, lesbians and other perverts should not stage their fests and parades in Lithuania" to join the counter-demonstration, and not to allow them to raise their flag.
"If we allow them to make the first step it would be more difficult to stop them from making the second," the Web site said.
But Juodyte told The Baltic Times that investigators were concentrating more on the user comments than on the Web site itself.
"There were comments that called [on people] to 'kill the pederasts,' to go and beat them and the like. All this falls under the article of the Criminal Code related to instigation of hatred," Juodyte said.
The leaflets, which were distributed before the planned anti-discrimination rally, had the same wording as the Web site, she said.
The banned anti-discrimination campaign, "For Diversity - Against Discrimination," had been organized in cooperation with the European Union, and aimed at promoting tolerance towards minority groups, including gays and lesbians. One of the highlights of the event was to have been the arrival of a so-called "anti-discrimination" truck, which was touring 19 EU member states. The 30-ton vehicle was designed to inform citizens of their rights under EU and national anti-discrimination legislation.
Following the Vilnius officials' decision to ban the rally, the EU in a statement said it "regretted the decision to cancel the planned event," and stressed that it was "the first time in the four years the truck has been on tour that a stop has been canceled by local authorities."
The decision to ban the anti-discrimination rally in Vilnius was the second incident related to the homosexual community's rights in Lithuania in May.
Earlier in the month trolleybus drivers in country's second largest city Kaunas, and then in Vilnius, refused to drive vehicles bearing advertisements promoting the rights of gays and lesbians.
