D’Amato Barred From Entering Lithuania
Soviet border guards Friday barred U.S. Sen. Alfonse D’Amato from entering Lithuania, and D’Amato later accused Moscow of trying to strangle the Baltic republic’s “cry for freedom.”
The New York Republican had a stamp in his passport that read, “Lithuanian Republic, Visa No. 3.” He said the president of the breakaway republic, Vytautus Landsbergis, had invited him to visit Vilnius.
Accompanied by Lithuania’s Foreign Minister Algrinas Saudragis, D’Amato and half a dozen aides traveled 200 miles from Warsaw to Ogrodniki, Lithuania’s only direct border opening to a non-Communist country. But at the small country border crossing, a Soviet major politely told him to go to a consulate and apply for a regular Soviet visa.
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