Information on the Victims of the Armed Forces of the USSR
On 11 and 13 January 1991 units of the Soviet Army occupied the buildings of
the Press Building, the Radio and Television Committee and TV Tower using tanks
and armored carriers, blank cannon cartridges, automatic weapons and bullets.
Unarmed people, who wanted to protect the free press and the free word, were
gathered at these buildings. Soviet soldiers beat the people with rifle butts and other
hard obiects, crushed them under the wheels of armored carriers and tank treads.
People at the TV Tower and Radio and Television Committee received especially
inhumane treatment. Eleven persons were killed there, two people died of wounds in
hospitals. We do not possess exact information on the total number of killed, because
the military did not permit ambulance doctors on the site of the attacks.
Data on the killed and injured are presented below. Up to 8 February, 676
injured people appealed for medical aid, 181 women among them; 378 persons
suffered injuries to their hearing; 99-suffered from different combined wounds
(crushed, lacerated, etc.); 55 persons had gun-shot wounds, 11 persons suffered from
burns; 144 persons were treated in hospitals, 90 of them are still hospitalized. One
person is still in critical condition.
Unfortunately, the Soviet Army's aggressive actions against the peaceful
population of Lithuania continue. Men are detained in streets, cars are stopped, their
passengers are forced to get out and are searched. There have been cases where
ambulance cars have been detained. In addition, soldiers beat people and shot at them
from automatic weapons. Soldiers take men to commandant headquarters or to
barracks and resort to violence: they even physically abuse people who have been
previously injured (e.g., a young man with his arm in a plater cast was severaly beaten
in Kaunas).
Since 20 January, the aggresion has become more active. From 20 January to
8 February, 15 injured men appealed for medical help, two of them with gunshot
wounds. Nine persons are treated in hospitals for complicated cerebral traums; one
person, Jonas Tautkus died on January 30, from a gunshot wound to the cerebrum.
We kindly reguest you to disseminate this information as widely as possible,
because the official mass media of the USSR is either suppressing it or presenting it in
a distorted manner.
The Ministry of Health sincerely thanks everybody who sympathized with us,
who helped us and is still renderng material help to Lithuanian medicine.
Juozas Oleka, M.D.
Minister of Health
Data on the victims who were killed during the attack on the TV tower and TV Center
in Vilnius, January 13,1991 or killed later.
1. ALVYDAS KANAPINSKAS, from Kedainiai, born 1952, injury by explosive of
the right side of the chest with rupture of a lung.
2. VYTAUTAS VAITKUS, from Vilnius, born 1943, double bullet wound of the
right side of the chest with rupture of a lung.
3. VIDAS MACIULEVIČIUS, from Vilnius, born 1966, bullet wound of the faceneck with injury of the spinal cord,
4. ALGIMANTAS-PETRAS KAVOLIUKAS, from Vilnius, born 1939,
crushed chest with fracture of the ribs and backbone and injury of the lungs
and spinal cord (run over by the wheels).
5. IGNAS ŠlMULIONIS, from Vilnius, born 1973, bullet injury of the head with
fracture of the skull bones and destruction of the brain.
6. VIRGINIJUS DRUSKIS, from Vilnius, born 1969, bullet wound of the chest with
injury of the heart and lung.
7. DARIUS GERBUTAVIČIUS, from Vilnius, born 1973, - bullet injury of the right
side of the chest, right hip and right shin.
8. APOLINARAS JUOZAS POVILAITIS, from Vilnius, born 1937, bullet injury of
the left side of the chest, right shoulder and right hip.
9. ROLANDAS JANKAUSKAS, from Vilnius, born 1969, crushed head and chest
with fracture of the skull bones, ribs and injury of the brain and interior organs of the
chest (run over by the tank track).
10. TITAS MASIULIS, from Kaunas, born 1962, double bullet wound of the chest
injury of the heart and lungs.
11. LORETA ASANAVIČIUTE, from Vilnius, born 1967, crushed pelvis and lower
extremities with fracture of the pelvic bones and injury of the soft tissues (run over by
tank track; died in hospital the same day).
12. RIMANTAS JUKNEVIČIUS, from Marijampole, born 1966, bullet wound of the
upper part of the right hip with injury of the large vessels (died in hospital the same
day).
13. ALVYDAS MATULKA, from Rokiškis, born 1960, died as a result of heart
attack during the attack on the TV tower.
14. VIKTOR SHATSKIKH, born 1969 - bullet wound of the right side of the back
with injury of a right lung.
Note: bullet injuries of both civilian people and the military (V.Shatskikh) have been
caused by 5.45 mm bullets.
15. JONAS TAUTKUS, from Vilnius, born 1970, died on January 30 -- as a result of
a bullet lodged in his brain. He was shot by a military patrol in an automobile near
Vilnius on January 29.
16. VYTAUTAS KANCEVIČIUS, from Kedainiai district, Titnagai, born 1941, died
on February 18 - as a result of a bullet wound to the stomach with multiple injuries to
the intestines and the urinary tract.
8 February 1991