Sen. D’Amato Barred in Lithuania : Baltics: N.Y. lawmaker assails Gorbachev after being turned away when he presents a visa.

Soviet border guards today refused Sen. Alfonse D’Amato entry into Lithuania, which has been locked in a war of wills with the Kremlin since the Baltic republic declared independence.

After being turned away at the small border crossing in northeast Poland, D’Amato denounced what he called the Soviet Union’s “psychological warfare” on Lithuania, whose Parliament approved the independence declaration March 11.

D’Amato wanted to enter Lithuania on a Lithuanian visa to demonstrate what he called Congress’ solidarity with the republic. Instead, the New York Republican, who was invited to the capital of Vilnius by Lithuanian President Vytautas Landsbergis, was instructed to apply for a Soviet visa at a consulate.

“The sooner the United States wakes up to what is taking place and becomes realistic, the better,” D’Amato told reporters at the border crossing.

“Mr. Gorbachev says one thing and does another. He talks about freedom and yet denies access to a free country. That is wrong.”

D’Amato flew to Poland on Thursday, planning to challenge the Soviet land blockade of Lithuania.

Accompanied by Lithuania’s foreign minister, Algrinas Saudragis, D’Amato and a half dozen aides traveled by chartered bus the 200 miles from Warsaw to Ogrodniki, Lithuania’s only direct border opening to the outside world.

They arrived at the crossing on a country road around 2 p.m. today, and Polish soldiers let them pass the first barrier on the Polish side. But another 100 yards down the road they came to a red-and-white barrier marking the Lithuanian frontier and guarded by Soviet KGB troops.

Through an interpreter speaking Lithuanian, D’Amato asked Soviet Maj. Vitas Buchis for permission to enter the country. Buchis, a native Lithuanian serving in the Soviet border force, said he had to check by telephone with Moscow.

After returning, Buchis told D’Amato that passage was forbidden. “I am sorry but rules are rules. I am just following orders,” he said.

Saudragis then crossed into Lithuania alone.

Extending his arm to D’Amato’s across the frontier, Saudragis said: “We shake hands over this border that divides us. But your support is strengthening our spirit.”

He also thanked the United States for never recognizing the forced incorporation of Lithuania into the Soviet Union in 1940.

The Soviet government since Tuesday has closed the Ogrodniki crossing to most traffic, permitting only Polish and Soviet citizens to use it to return home.

Even in normal times, citizens of other countries are not allowed to pass the pair of wooden gates on the narrow rural road.