News

On 2 November, the Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania Mantvydas Bekešius took part in an event to commemorate the memory of the murdered Jews and in the unveiling ceremony of the monument to them at the Seventh Fort in Kaunas.

“No monument can fill the void or relieve the suffering of those who lost their loved ones at the Seventh Fort and throughout Lithuania during the Holocaust. As we honour their sacrifices and perpetuate their memory, we recall the painful history and we do our best to make sure that this does not happen again,” said Bekešius.

Lithuania’s Foreign Vice-Minister also stressed that the Lithuanian young generation had to know the history of the Holocaust well and to understand that the country had lost almost all of its Jewish community due to the genocide.

“The words ‘never again’ are neither empty, nor declarative. They render an important commitment of future generations to their fellow citizens – Litvaks – to prevent a repeat of the tragedy and to make clear that anti-Semitism has no place in Lithuania,” said Bekešius, who laid a wreath at the monument at the Seventh Fort in Kaunas.

Lithuania’s Foreign Vice-Minister thanked the Deputy Mayor of Kaunas City Simonas Kairys, members of the Council and Kaunas’ Jewish community, due to whose initiative and funding this monument was erected.

The event at the Seventh Fort began at the barracks with a short conversation with members of Kaunas’ Jewish community, representatives of the Cultural Heritage Division at the Kaunas City Municipal Administration and other participants.

The site of the mass grave of nearly 5,000 residents of Kaunas has been located by the public institution “Military Heritage Centre” that manages the Seventh Fort in Kaunas and has carried out applied historical research. Thanks to the effort of the crew of the Seventh Fort, Kaunas’ Jewish community and volunteers, which has continued for a number of years, the site has been cleaned and maintained.

The Seventh Fort was the first concentration camp in Nazi-occupied territories that was established on 30 June 1941. Up to 5,000 people, mostly Jews living in Kaunas, were murdered in the Seventh Fort’s territory in less than two months. In addition, some 1,500 Ukrainian prisoners died from cold in the winter of 1941.