Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, February 10, 1991 TAG: 9102100067
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: The Baltimore Sun
DATELINE: VILNIUS, LITHUANIA LENGTH: Medium
With 87 percent of the vote counted early this morning, 91 percent of voters backed Lithuania's self-proclaimed status as a "democratic, independent republic," officials in the republican Parliament reported. Turnout in the referendum was reported to average 86 percent, despite a boycott by Moscow loyalists.
Appearing on television Saturday night - a jerry-rigged broadcast because Soviet troops still occupy the republic's main TV studios - Lithuanian President Vytautas Landsbergis congratulated citizens on "a good day."
"The great majority of people in Lithuania no longer have any fear, and once again express their determination to the world," he said. "Today we did good work, and we took one more step along the road to independence."
Gorbachev had discounted the expected result of the voting in advance, declaring it "legally invalid." He said it was an attempt to skirt the March 17 referendum that will ask voters throughout the Soviet Union whether the country's unity should be preserved.
To underscore Soviet power over Lithuania and its Baltic neighbors, Latvia and Estonia, the Soviet armed forces began 10 days of "training exercises" today in the three republics. Dozens of trucks carrying troops were spotted in Vilnius and the second-largest city, Kaunas. The republic's information service alleged that 1,400 KGB cadets had flown in from Central Asia and Siberia Friday.
The timing of the troop movements was clearly aimed at intimidation, particularly after the Jan. 13 attack by troops on demonstrators at Lithuanian broadcast facilities that left 14 dead. But there were no immediate reports of troops interfering with the balloting.
Lithuanian officials and citizens at the polls said they were beyond intimidation. "We have nowhere to retreat to. We can only move forward, no matter what happens," said Dalius Sulekauskas, 43, a driver for Lithuanian television and radio who said he voted "Yes."
Voters said the plebiscite is more than an exercise in proving what has long been obvious from opinion polls and election returns: that Lithuanians want out of the Soviet Union.
They said the vote should clinch Western backing for independence and quiet demagogic claims from Moscow that "the people," unlike the nationalist leaders they have elected, really want to stay in the union.
"I voted for an independent Lithuania," said Violetta Bulotiene, manager of an advertising agency, as she walked out of Vilnius' Precinct 24 at midafternoon. "It's so natural. How could anyone vote against it?"
Bulotiene, 40, said she first became an active backer of independence after visiting relatives in the United States nearly 20 years ago. Now, she said, she wants the U.S. to pay attention to the poll.
"I hope once we demonstrate in a vote the overwhelming support for independence, the United States will recognize Lithuania diplomatically," she said. "I hope other countries will help us and support us."
About 80 percent of the population of 3.8 million, and 80 percent of the 2.7 million voters, are ethnic Lithuanians. Interviews at polling places in three cities Saturday failed to turn up any ethnic Lithunanians who admitted not voting or voting against independence.
But the opposition, mainly Slav workers led by the small remaining number of Moscow-loyal Communists, boycotted the referendum. In some heavily Russian, Byelorussian and Polish districts, turnout was as low as 15 percent to 30 percent.
Pyotr Ozernov, 55, a Russian electrician at the big 40th Anniversary of October machine-building factory in the suburb of New Vilnius, went to Precinct 195 but did not vote.
With a handful of like-minded opponents of independence, he sat at a table and kept a lookout for fraud. By making rows of tiny crosses on a piece of paper as voters dropped their marked ballots into the box, he said, he could check the number of votes officially recorded and see if independence activists were cheating.
"What do they want to be independent of?" snarled Ozernov, who has lived 26 years in Lithuania. "Do they want to live independent of Siberian natural gas and Baku oil?"
by CNB