MINSK (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 01st September, 2021) Lithuania refused to provide Belarus with legal assistance in the criminal investigation of genocide against the local population during the Great Patriotic War, the Belarusian Prosecutor General's Office said on Wednesday.
In April, Belarusian Prosecutor General Andrei Shved announced that the country was opening a criminal probe into the genocide. Shved emphasized that Minsk will seek extradition of war criminals who are still alive for an open trial in Belarus. The prosecutor general also noted that Belarus will submit evidence to the international tribunal to launch the procedure for recognizing genocide. The first package of documents is expected to be prepared by the end of the year.
"The Belarusian Prosecutor General's Office received a response from the Prosecutor General's Office of the Republic of Lithuania about its refusal to provide legal assistance in the criminal case on genocide against the population of Belarus," the prosecutors said in a statement.
In its request for assistance, filed in June, Belarus indicated that investigators were studying information about reprisal raids, settlements destruction, and kidnapping, and also establishing exact numbers of civilian fatalities. Minsk also asked Vilnius to interrogate members of Lithuanian punitive battalions.
However, Lithuanian prosecutors "ignored the previously undertaken international obligations and unreasonably referred to Article 19 of the Belasurian-Lithuanian treaty on legal assistance, signed on October 20, 1992, and notified of their refusal to accept the order for execution, since in their opinion this may harm sovereignty and security, and rights and legitimate interests of citizens," the Belarusian Prosecutor General's Office noted.
