On June 3, the 35th anniversary of the freedom movement called “Sąjūdis” was commemorated in Vilnius. Leading to one of the most important events in Lithuanian history, on June 3, 1988, the Sąjūdis (“Lietuvos persitvarkymo sąjūdis”, the Lithuanian Reform Movement) elected its leadership, then established its goal to restore the country’s independence on February 16, 1989, and declared it on March 11, 1990.
A special parliamentary session was held last weekend to mark the event, with speeches by President Gitanas Nausėda, Seimas speaker Viktorija Čmilytė-Nielsen, the first president of the restored nation Prof. Vytautas Landsbergis, founder Alvydas Medalinskas, and other officials. The commemoration was aired on TV, the Seimas website, YouTube and LRT.
An academic conference called the History and Experience of Sąjudis was held on June 3 at the Science Academy in Vilnius, where the organization first took form. Some members of the founding group expressed disappointment that the commemorative parliamentary session was given priority and government officials did not attend the conference. The purpose of the conference was to review the events and activists leading to the restoration of independence, and to bring to light unknown facts about the movement and its development. Conference organizers also presented an exhibition of photographs of Sąjūdis history.
Alkas.lt presents a list of those visionaries – intellectuals and activists who established the freedom movement in 1988. They were Regimantas Adomaitis †, Vytautas Jurgis Bubnys †, Juozas Bulavas †Antanas Buračas,Algimantas Čekuolis, Virgilijus Čepaitis, Vaclovas Daunoras †, Sigitas Geda †, Bronius Genzelis, Arvydas Juozaitis, Julius Juzeliūnas †, Algirdas Kaušpėdas, Č,slovas Kudaba †, Bronius Kuzmickas, Vytautas Landsbergis, Bronius Leonavičius, Meilė Lukšienė †, Alfonsas Maldonis †, Justinas Marcinkevičius †, Alvydas Medalinskas, Jokūbas Minkevičius †, Algimantas Nasvytis †, Romualdas Ozolas †, Romas Pakalnis †, Saulius Pečiulis †, Vytautas Petkevičius †, Kazimiera Prunskienė, Vytautas Radžvilas, Raimundas Rajeckas †, Artūras Skučas, Gintaras Songaila, Arvydas Šaltenis, Vitas Tomkus, Zigmas Vaišvila, Arūnas Žebriūnas †.
Many other events will take place in June and July throughout Lithuania to commemorate Sąjūdis inception, including exhibitions and excursions.
