Lithuanian president's aide says too early to comment on unsealing ex-KGB collaborators

VILNIUS - Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda's chief communication adviser Frederikas Jansonas said on Tuesday that it is still too early to comment on the idea of declassifying the names of individuals who admitted to collaborating with the Soviet KGB, as the final version of the legislation remains unclear.

"We have two bills at this stage, and it's hard to say what they'll turn into - whether they'll be merged or remain as competing proposals, and what form they'll ultimately take in the plenary hall," Jansonas told the Ziniu Radijas radio station.

"Therefore, it would be premature to say that the president's position at this moment is this or that," he added.

Remigijus Zemaitaitis, leader of Nemunas Dawn, a ruling coalition party, and MP Arvydas Anusauskas of the opposition conservative Homeland Union-Lithuanian Christian Democrats (HU-LCD) have tabled separate legislative amendments on declassifying the identities of former KGB collaborators.

Anusauskas proposes that once the KGB collaborators' files are declassified, "the procedure for using information and data about them shall be set by institutions authorized by the government".

Zemaitaitis' amendments state that individuals who admitted to KGB collaboration are classified, except for "state politicians, state officials, civil servants, judges, intelligence officers, professional military personnel, heads of state and municipal enterprises, budgetary institutions, and their structural units, their deputies, public establishments where at least one of the founders or shareholders is the state or municipality (municipalities), and heads and deputies of their structural units, public information producers and distributors, and political party members".

The law, which took effect on February 1, 2000, allowed former KGB and other Soviet intelligence officers and secret collaborators to confess and register with a special commission. The records of those who came forward were classified for 15 years, meaning until the secrecy label on their files expired.

As the deadline approached, the parliament in June 2015 passed an amendment extending the classification period to 75 years for those who had confessed.

According to Jansonas, extending the classification period in 2015 "may not have been the best or most sensible decision".

"The issue is back on the table today. Is it really that relevant? One could argue either way. But if there's now an effort to fix a mistake made 15 years ago and this is being done by someone who, in fact, was among those who voted for that mistake... then again, we should probably wait and see what it turns into," the adviser said, referring to Zemaitaitis.

Even the current law does not guarantee absolute secrecy for former KGB collaborators.

If such individuals run for president, parliament, or local government, or apply for government posts or positions as judges or prosecutors, their confession is no longer considered a state secret and this fact of their biography must be made public.

Back in 1991 and 1992, former KGB collaborators had the opportunity to confess to a temporary parliamentary commission.

After a deadline for voluntary confessions was set, 1,589 people turned to the Lustration Commission and admitted to their past collaborations with the Soviet secret services.

Several amendments to the law were previously introduced in the parliament in an effort to declassify the names of KGB collaborators, but none were passed.