Wednesday morning saw the State Border Guard Service (SBGS) commander, Vainius Butinas, coming to a hospital in Klaipėda to visit two SBGS officials who had been shot at the border with Russia.

 

Mr. Butinas received evidence in the Klaipėda hospital that, albeit injuries are not unserious, officials’ lives are out of danger. “We shall offer these staff every assistance, because they sustained injuries when they performed an official duty,” said Mr. Butinas. “We shall undoubtedly keep the threats of the situation in mind when we plan our further operations at that [border] section.”

 

The SBGS commander stated the incident at the border with Russia proved that all imaginable bounds were exceeded. “Now [criminals] not only attempt at running vehicles at SBGS staff at that [border] section, which has not been uncommon; not only are officials threatened or their property encroached. That was the first time when staff were shot at and, preliminarily, it was only by [good] fortune that they remained alive. Surely, we regret very much the gunman who had turned his weapon against them was shot dead when the officials defended themselves,” he said.

 

Preliminarily, a man who had been approached for detention opened fire injuring two SBGS staff in the village of Paleičiai, Šilutė district, near the river of Nemunas (Neman), at the border with Russia, Wednesday night. The gunman was shot dead during the incident.

 

At night, SBGS Pagėgiai Frontier District’s border guard officials spotted several suspects. Preliminarily, when those were approached for detention, one suspect whom the officials wanted to check on the grounds of his being in the frontier zone, opened fire with a handgun.

 

Two officials of the Special Tasks Squad of the SBGS Pagėgiai Frontier District were injured. One  received a chest injury and the other had his leg wounded. The man who offered resistance to the SBGS officials was shot dead by their colleague with an official handgun.

 

The gunman had been warned, orally and with shots to the air. Preliminarily, the man, 44, is a resident of the Pagėgiai municipality.

 

The incident is investigated by the Prosecutor’s Office of the Šilutė neighbourhood. The commander of the SBGS, Vainius Butinas, and head of the SBGS Operational Activity [criminal investigation] Board, Antanas Montvydas, urgently went to the scene of the incident Wednesday night.