The Baltic Way is not only a memory of the Baltic States, but also of UNESCO
This year marks the 35th anniversary of the Baltic Way, the peaceful human chain that united the people of three countries - Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia - in the name of freedom. The Baltic Way was organized on 23 August 1989, 50 years after the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was signed in 1939, when secret protocols between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union led to the 1940 occupation of Lithuania and the other Baltic States.
The Baltic Way campaign—a massive peaceful demonstration—drew the world's attention, bringing to light the secret Molotov-Ribbentrop protocols, which were previously unknown to many, and accelerated Lithuania's path to independence. A human chain stretched for 670 km from Vilnius to Riga and Tallinn. This massive peaceful demonstration was organized by the Lithuanian Reform Movement Sąjūdis, along with the Estonian and Latvian Popular Fronts. This event expressed the demand of the three nations to rectify the injustice committed half a century earlier, astonishing with its scale and peacefulness.
Finally, this event received international recognition—in 2009, 20 years after this peaceful mass demonstration, the joint application from Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania titled "The Baltic Way – Human Chain Linking Three States in Their Drive for Freedom" was inscribed in UNESCO's "Memory of the World" international register. The collection consists of 38 written, visual, and audio documents that bear witness to this unprecedented political action. These are preserved in the Lithuanian Central State Archive, the Estonian National Archive, and the Latvian Popular Front Museum. Lithuania contributed 23 documents to this collection, including three audio recordings of Sąjūdis meetings, the August 23, 1989 LRT "Panorama" news broadcast, a documentary film, and eighteen photographs.
The Baltic Way's human chain of people holding hands is also recorded in the Guinness World Book of Records as the longest human chain. The route stretched from Vilnius through Ukmergė, Panevėžys, Pasvalys, Bauska, Riga, Ainaži, Pärnu, and ended in Tallinn.
The locations where participants of the Baltic Way stood have become memorable for everyone—these participants themselves erected memorial markers. Later, these sites were included in the Cultural Heritage Register. Currently, there are 44 sites along the Baltic Way that are listed in the Cultural Heritage Register as national significance locations for Baltic Way memorial markers. However, it is not the markers themselves (often wooden crosses, memory stones) that are protected, but the locations. Communities that placed the markers can restore, maintain, or replace them at their discretion when the old ones deteriorate. Cultural heritage specialists have left this responsibility to the initiative, creativity, and memory of the people. The communities and participants in the municipalities where these locations are situated take care of, maintain, and clean these sites. The memory lives on.
It is worth remembering that at the very beginning of the struggle for independence, the nation’s demands were perhaps primarily directed towards heritage protection. It was a sort of non-political form of struggle, which even Moscow could not officially oppose. Numerous campaigns, clean-ups and pickets were organized to draw attention to the destruction or disappearance of Lithuania’s important cultural heritage, as well as seeking to encourage its preservation. These actions united the nation, raised awareness, encouraged us to look back to our roots, our history, our European cultural identity, demonstrated our links with Europe, and led us to full independence.
The Baltic Way played a decisive role in preserving the cultural heritage of our country; this event changed the history of Lithuania and encouraged society to fundamentally rediscover the value of its cultural heritage, the value of which and the kinship with Europe was kept silent during the Soviet era, it was not publicly written about and talked about, for example, manors were a complete taboo, they were “out of place” with the Soviet system. Since 1994, when Lithuania joined the organization of the EHD, this fundamental shift in history has given an additional impetus to the public to thoroughly introduce various heritage-related topics, to make known what had been deliberately hidden, ignored, and sought to be erased from the memory of the “Soviet” generation, and to stimulate debate in society on the preservation of heritage. People have begun to identify themselves with their cultural heritage, to understand why it is important to us. The public felt like the real owners of their country.
Photo: A commemorative marker erected on the Lithuanian-Latvian border by the initiative of the Lithuanian Reform Movement Sąjūdis’ organizing committee and the organizers of the Baltic Way in 1989.
Author: Jūrate Mičiulienė