30th Anniversary of the Freedom Defenders' Day
13th of January is the 30th Anniversary of the Freedom Defenders' Day for Republic of Lithuania to commemorate 14 victims that lost their lives during Soviet aggression on January 13, 1991. From January 12th 4pm til January 13th 9am thematic installation can be viewed on Tallinn Freedom Square, part of which is projected on the windows of Tallinn Art Hall Gallery. Author of the installation is animator Aurelijus Čiupas.
Lithuania became the first country to declare independence from the Soviet Union in March 1990, and on January 8, 1991, Moscow sent in the Special Forces commando to re-establish lost control. Just after midnight of January 13, Soviet tanks started to fire blank rounds around the TV tower and the Radio and Television Committee building (the offices of present-day of Lithuanian National Broadcaster in Vilnius), shattering windows in nearby buildings and inflicting shrapnel injuries and hearing damage to hundreds of unarmed people around the tower. Soviet soldiers then started to fire live ammunition overhead and into civilian’s crowds, tanks drove straight through lines of people. Fourteen people were killed in the Soviet attacks, most of them shot and two crushed by tanks, and hundreds of peaceful civilians were injured.
Everybody understood that the next and main target for the Soviets was the Parliament. Thousands of Lithuanians gathered around the Parliament, people started building anti-tank barricades, while defenders were setting up defences inside the building. Crowds of people prayed, sang and shouted pro-independence slogans, as columns of Soviet military trucks, armoured vehicles and tanks were moving into the vicinity. Eventually, the Soviets troops cancelled their plans to storm the Parliament at the very last moment, thanks to the crowds of people who protected their country, Independence and democracy.
After Soviet troops invaded the TV Tower and Radio and Television building, they immediately terminated live broadcasts - the last pictures transmitted were of a Soviet special forces soldier running towards the camera and switching it off. Meanwhile, a small TV studio in Kaunas, Lithuania’s second-largest city, took over the TV and radio broadcasts of independent Lithuania. Famous song “Laisvė” (Freedom) was aired 50 times during that night.
