This was reported to the news portal lrytas.lt by Vytis Zavackas, the Chief Culture, Education and Sports Specialist of the Kupiškis District Municipality, who participated in the reconstruction of the stand on Tuesday together with Valius Kazlauskas, the head of the Freedom Struggle Department of the Rokiškis Regional Museum, public figures Algirdas Jasiūnas, Povilas Stumbris and the latter’s grandson.
The stand set up last autumn, which describes the history of the partisans of the Algirds company Berman squad of the Šarūnas national team of Vytautas district, was destroyed in the spring of this year. Vandals broke it into many small pieces, which were found on the ground.
According to V. Zavacko, the other stand on the same site, informing about the Notigalė marsh management project, was not damaged, so it is believed that the destruction of the stand about the freedom struggles could have been a deliberate act of vandals, directed against the history of Lithuanian partisans.
After the attack, the representatives of the municipality of Kupiškis district made sure that everything was completely restored: not only a new stand was installed, but also the old directions to the bunker, located in the forests of Notigalė about a kilometer from the stand, were changed.
Guerrillas of the Berman group, located in this bunker, lived in inhumanly difficult conditions – in damp, swampy areas, they fought heroically against the occupation.
On December 12, 1946, Soviet NKVD hitmen killed 14 partisans in the Notigalė swamp.
After the reconstruction of the bunker, these places are visited by more and more people who are interested in the freedom struggle, not only from Aukštaitia, but also from all over Lithuania.
The police are currently conducting an administrative offense investigation regarding the initial vandalism of the stand – it was decided not to file a criminal case because, as explained by the representatives of the Panevėžys County Chief Police Commissariat, a small financial loss was caused.
In addition, the officials did not want to see that this barbaric act was directed against the history of Lithuanian partisans, because the gazebo near the stand was allegedly damaged.
However, this gazebo is subject to continuous damage, and there is no evidence that this was done at the same time as the stand was destroyed.
The representatives of law enforcement emphasized the financial expression, not taking into account the fact that the vandals with their actions despised the memory of the freedom struggles, mocked the partisans’ contribution to them, and generally the history of armed post-war resistance.
The vandals have not yet been identified, and the search for them is underway.
2024-08-28 20:39:27