The Seimas commission investigating the history of the VSD reporter asks the STT to declassify the submitted material

“Unfortunately, it happened that according to the law, the owners of the information are STT, and this prevents the commission from commenting on the information received during this meeting. But we officially asked the STT to declassify the information that was submitted to the commission”, commission chairman Vytautas Bakas told journalists on Wednesday following the meeting.

He confirmed that the material submitted to the STT is related to the “fate of the investigation and the fate of the evidence in this investigation” conducted by the service, but said that it does not constitute a state secret, as classified information is defined by the State and Service Secrets Law.

“In the commission’s opinion, the classified letters of the STT do not meet the criteria stipulated in the law, where it is said that only such information can be classified that may pose a threat to state security and the activities of special services,” noted V. Bakas.

“From what STT presented, there is nothing like that, the public has the right to know. Therefore, we officially appealed to L. Pernavas, asking him to declassify what he submitted, and to avoid declassifying data which in essence do not constitute a state secret, but are important for the public’s right to know regarding some important processes”, noted V. Bakas.

L. Pernavas told journalists following the commission meeting that he might not comment on anything, including the possibility of declassifying information, saying that all that was discussed was the material of the closed meeting.

The questioning of the head of STT took place in a closed session, following which the commission listened to the book “The Speaker and the President”, part of the content of which is based on the stories of T. Gailius, authored by Birutė Davidonytė and Dovydas Pancerova.

The temporary commission of the Seimas is clarifying the information of the VSD speaker T. Gailius regarding the actions of the department heads in checking the environment of Gitanas Nausėdas, who was a candidate for the presidency at the time, the financing of the previous presidential elections, and other issues.

The former head of STT, Žydrūnas Bartkus, who testified to the commission at the last meeting, said that following checking the information of T. Gailius, no signs of a crime were found, so the criminal intelligence investigation did not turn into a pre-trial investigation.

T. Gailius, who decided not to hide his identity, said in his earlier testimony to the commission that he suspected that his managers might have committed a disciplinary violation or even a crime, which is why he turned to politicians and became a whistleblower. He also confirmed that while working in intelligence, he had seen information regarding the possibly non-transparent financing of the 2019 presidential election campaign, but did not single out a specific candidate.

After the testimony of T. Gailius, the VSD reiterated that it followed the law when it inspected the team of then presidential candidate G. Nausėda.

The former general prosecutor Evaldas Pašilis and his former deputy Žydrūnas Radišauskas, who previously testified before the Seimas commission, said that following receiving the informant’s information, the STT seemed to be the most appropriate institution to assess it at that time.

According to former prosecutors, the STT conducted a nine-month criminal intelligence investigation, which was terminated without any evidence of criminal activity. The rapporteur takes the position that a criminal intelligence investigation should have led to a pre-trial investigation.

In the book “The Speaker and the President” published at the beginning of 2023, part of the content of which is based on the stories of T. Gailius, questions are raised regarding the transparency of the financing of the election campaign of G. Nausėdas.

G. Nausėda rejects suspicions regarding possibly non-transparent financing of the campaign, and also asserts that he is ready to answer the commission’s questions in writing.