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On 16 April, people in all Lithuania took part in the environment-cleaning campaign “Darom 2011”. Employees of the Lithuanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and foreign diplomats cleaned up the Jašiūnai manor park in Šalčininkai district.The Foreign Ministry’s initiative to clean the manor park was supported by the Estonian, Georgia and Azerbaijani Ambassadors to Lithuania, Chinese diplomats, staff of the Šalčininkai district municipal administration and inhabitants of Jašiūnai.

“During this year’s campaign “Darom” we decided to clean the Jašiūnai Estate - several hundred years old historical and cultural monument, which is associated with cultures of many peoples. We hope that this initiative will encourage people to take interest in the history of the Jašiūnai manor, to dedicate attention to our cultural heritage and to restore this estate,” said Lithuanian Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs Evaldas Ignatavičius who took part in the campaign.

The Vice-Minister, foreign ambassadors and representatives from the Šalčininkai district municipal administration planted three oak-trees in the manor park.

The Jašiūnai manor is one of Lithuania’s most authentic late Classicist style manor houses, but the park is neglected and not very well maintained. The manor house is a cultural heritage monument, included in the list of cultural heritage objects of Lithuania for its archaeological, historical and urban value.

The Jašiūnai manor (15th–18th century) was owned by the Radvila family, Jonas Sniadeckis settled here at the beginning of the 19th century. The Estate became an important cultural centre: it had a rich library, such Vilnius University Professors as Andrius Sniadeckis, Stanislovas Bonifacas Jundzilas, and writer Adomas Mickevičius were frequent guests here. The Estate is surrounded by one of the most beautiful Classicist style parks in Lithuania.

The town is important to Lithuania’s history not only because of the manor - in 1920 at Jašiūnai Lithuanian troops fought the Polish forces led by Lucjan Żeligowski. In 1941 in Jašiūnai, security police of the Nazi occupation administration shot 575 people, mostly Jews.