Lithuania Retaliates, Halts Gas Supply to Soviet Bases

The Lithuanian government, in a rebellious tit-for-tat gesture, announced Sunday that it is ending all gasoline supplies to Soviet military bases in the republic and blocking the international export of goods produced by Soviet-run factories in Lithuania.

Officials also said they are eliminating some local bus and streetcar routes to conserve gasoline, and the republic’s president appealed to citizens to demonstrate their fortitude as the Kremlin seeks to isolate them economically.

At the same time, the government sent a high-level delegation to Moscow to seek a political solution with Soviet leaders. However, the delegation, headed by Lithuanian Vice President Bronius Kuzmickas, did not have an appointment with any Soviet official when it left Vilnius on Sunday night.

“The pressure is growing for all the people of Lithuania,” President Vytautas Landsbergis said on Lithuanian television. “Sometimes you cannot believe that big Russia can do such things to little Lithuania. Lithuania hasn’t committed any crime against the Soviet Union.”

Nevertheless, he urged the Lithuanian people to persevere. “You must try to stand the economic blockade as long as you can. Time will show that our people can survive,” he said.

In response to Moscow’s decision to dry up gasoline pipes running into the republic, Lithuanian leaders said they were eliminating all gasoline supplies that go to Soviet military bases in the republic. It is expected, however, that those bases will continue to receive gasoline from Moscow.

In another step likely to anger Moscow, officials blocked the export by sea to other countries of goods produced by Lithuanian factories that are run by the Soviet Union. The Lithuanian leaders argued that they did not want any of the foreign currency earned from those products to go to the Soviet government.

And in a telegram sent to Soviet Prime Minister Nikolai I. Ryzhkov, the Lithuanian government said it has been forced by the blockade of some raw materials to stop exporting to the Soviet Union a number of items produced in the republic, including electric motors, television receivers and textiles.

The Soviet Union began late Wednesday to impose economic sanctions against the republic. Moscow confirmed it has cut off all oil supplies and about 84% of natural gas supplies. Lithuanian leaders further charge that other goods are being blocked, ranging from wood and metals to fish and sugar.

That was denied Sunday by Andrei Girenko, a secretary in the Communist Party Central Committee. Girenko, in Vilnius to attend a meeting of the pro-Moscow faction of the Lithuanian Communist Party, told a news conference that although Moscow has cut oil and gas supplies to Lithuania, other goods are still flowing to the republic.

“Plans for a total economic blockade do not exist,” Girenko said. “The measures which are being undertaken in accordance with the decisions of the president (Mikhail S. Gorbachev) can in no way be considered as a blockade of Lithuania. They cover only a small part of the production that was supplied and continues to be supplied to Lithuania.”

The economic sanctions began after Lithuania defied an ultimatum from Gorbachev, who gave them an Easter weekend deadline to rescind legislation bolstering their unprecedented March 11 declaration of independence from the Soviet Union.

The Lithuanian leadership has offered to negotiate the legislation and all other issues except the sovereignty declaration itself. But that has not satisfied Moscow.

Girenko, the highest-ranking Soviet official to visit Lithuania since the independence declaration, also said he will not meet with members of the Lithuanian government during his stay in the republic. He repeated Moscow’s insistence that Lithuania first withdraw what the Soviets consider to be an unconstitutional sovereignty declaration.

“I think that in the end, good sense will prevail,” Girenko said. “There are forces in the republic that understand what could happen and what a catastrophe it could lead to.”

A participant in the congress of the pro-Moscow faction of the Lithuanian Communist Party attended by Girenko, meanwhile, complained in an interview with the daily Sovietskaya Rossiya that his homeland has become “captive to a nationalistic euphoria.”

Reactionary nationalists, said Mykolas Burokyanvichus, are “leading Soviet Lithuania to a political dead end and the people to tragedy.” His viewpoint, however, is mirrored by only about 10% of the republic’s population, according to a recent poll.

Lithuanian officials have warned that the republic cannot survive for long under an economic blockade.

Times staff writer Hamilton reported from Moscow and Schrader, a free-lance journalist, from Vilnius.