Lithuania returned a Russian man who swam along the Nemunas and asked for asylum to the Kaliningrad region

The man was detained on September 17 at around 13:50 on the Nemunas riverbank in Lithuania’s Pagėgiai municipality. After that, Lithuanian authorities, including Lithuania’s State Security Department, assessed his request.

Lithuania’s Interior Minister Martynas Katelinas said that the Russian man requested asylum and claimed persecution in Russia because of his activity on social media. After consultations, the authorities decided to return him to Russia.

A representative of Lithuania’s State Border Guard Service (VSAT), Giedrius Mišutis, said that the man was deemed inadmissible to Lithuanian territory and processed under the same procedure applied to people denied entry from Belarus. According to him, the authorities had no data about threats to the man, his special status, or the possibility of his acceptance in the European Union, and he was not classified as a vulnerable person.

The Russian man was returned to the Kaliningrad region after 19:00 through the Panemunė border checkpoint. Before that, border guards took care of his condition after the swim and gave him dry clothes.

There is a discrepancy in the information about the man’s age: Katelinas said he was about 60 years old, while Mišutis said he was 68. In February, Lithuanian border guards had already reported a similar case, when a 68-year-old citizen of Russia, Germany, and Ireland crossed from the Kaliningrad region into Lithuania over the frozen Nemunas.

Sources

• Mediazona