Two accused of spying for Russia convicted in Lithuania

The Klaipeda Regional Court of Lithuania found two citizens of the republic guilty of espionage for Russia, informs BNS agency citing the court.

The general director of the Baltic Youth Association Juvenis, Aleksejus Greicius, was sentenced in this case to four years in prison. In court, he pleaded not guilty. Mindaugas Tunikaitis was sentenced to 1.5 years in prison. He pleaded guilty.

The criminal case was considered behind closed doors.

Greicius and Tunikaitis, detained in March 2020, were accused of collecting information, which was then transmitted to the FSB. The defendants did not know each other, but, according to the court, kept in touch with the same FSB agent operating in the Kaliningrad region. For the information collected and transmitted, Greicius and Tunikaitis received a reward.

Tunikaitis lived on the border with the Kaliningrad region of the Russian Federation, regularly traveled there. For almost six years he took photos and videos of objects of interest to the FSB.

Greicius, according to the case file, has been organizing events for almost four years, which were fully or partially financed by a representative of the Russian special service. The accused of espionage filmed the persons participating in these events, and handed the recordings to the FSB representative.

The court noted that the information transferred to the Russian side did not constitute a state secret, but in fact equated this information with secret, since foreign special services were interested in them. The accused faced a sentence of three to 15 years in prison.

Tunikaitis was sentenced to a term of imprisonment below the minimum, as the court considered his marital status and health condition as mitigating circumstances.

The law gives 20 days to appeal against the verdict.