80 Years after the Pirčiupiai Massacre, an Ascending Lithuanian politician gives the Nazi SS a Pass!

Pirčiupių kapinės (centre 3 kryžiai, pastatyti tuojau po tragedijos)© Rūta Averkienė, https://www.vle.lt/straipsnis/pirciupiai/

(the Lithuanian Encyclopedia)

This year is the 80th anniversary of a horrible massacre in Lithuania: on the morning of June 3, 1944, near a village known since the 16th century as the site of Grand Duke hunting grounds, Soviet partisans placed mines in the path of two trucks carrying 14 SS men, and then fired on the survivors. Six Germans were killed, eight escaped.

SS Commander Walter Titel of the 16th SS Police Regiment sent a punishment squadron from Eišiškii: the 9th and 10th companies of the 3rd battalion of the regiment, along with 17 trucks, 3 tanks and a self-propelled gun. The SS surrounded the village, drove people from their huts to the middle of the village, and looted their property. 15 of the strongest men were selected and driven into the center. Grenades were thrown and fires set. Those who broke out of the fires were shot. A second group of strong men was also dealt with in this way, then women, children and the remaining men were beaten and burned. All the huts of the village were set on fire. In all, 119 people were burned: 61 women, 58 men, including 45 children under the age of 15, and 4 babies. To cover up the crime, the bodies of the dead were doused with gasoline and burned. The bodies were not allowed to be buried for eight days.

A granite monument, "Mother of Pirčiupiai", and a memorial plaque with a relief and the names of the victims, by sculptor G. Jokūbonis, architect V. Gabriūnas was erected in 1960 and commemorates the event.

Today, November 8, the Social Democratic Party’s (LSDP) prime minister-designate Gintautas Paluckas announced that a three-party ruling coalition would be created: the "LSDP," the "Democrats For Lithuania," and the "Nemunas Dawn/Nemuno Aušra" party, led by Remigijus Žemaitaitis. "The contours of the coalition are clear. An agreement has been reached in principle," said Paluckas, who assured reporters that there were no disagreements between the parties.

No disagreements? Žemaitaitis recently avoided impeachment from Parliament by stepping down, after being accused of breaking his oath of office by posting anti-semitic statements online. The most outrageous, with absolutely no basis in fact: his June 2023 Facebook posts claiming that "Jews and Russians" were responsible for the 1944 Pirčiupiai massacre, not SS Nazis.

His defense: “Thank God, my opponents did not accuse me of molesting children, which haunts the ruling Homeland Union. If someone in Lithuania calls you an anti-semite, it means you’re so transparent and spotless wherever they look. That is the only thing they can concoct, and attempt to smear me. The still powerful clan of former KGB  members and their accomplices, as well as the neo-liberals besmear us,” said Žemaitaitis, who is also on record saying that any future aid to Ukraine should be in the form of loans. What a patriot.

Postscript, November 26, 2024: In Vilnius and Kaunas, thousands demonstrated in front of parliament at news of the appointment of social democrat Gintautas Paluckas as prime minister. The protest was sparked less by Paluckas himself than by his plan to bring the nationalist and populist party Nemuno aušra (Dawn of Nemunas) into the government.