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On the occasion of the Day for Tolerance, dissident, former member of the Lithuanian Helsinki Group Viktoras Petkus received the award of honour of Lithuania’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs – ‘Lithuanian Diplomacy Star’ - for his long-term contribution to the resistance movement and to the re-establishment of Lithuania’s independence, also for fostering democratic values and protecting human rights.

The award was conferred at the decision of Lithuanian Minister of Foreign Affairs Audroniaus Ažubalis on 16 November. Lithuanian Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs Asta Skaisgirytė Liauškienė conferred the award during the international conference “Tolerance and Totalitarianism. Challenges to Freedom” at the Tolerance Centre of the Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum.

On 20 August 1977, a long-time fighter for independence V.Petkus and his like-minded friends set up the Committee of the National Movement of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, which aimed at a peaceful re-establishment of the independence of the Baltic States.

He was among the founders of the Lithuanian Helsinki Group. During the years of the Soviet occupation, he was held for several decades as a prisoner at Gulag prison camps in Siberia.

In 1994, V.Petkus was awarded the Cross of the Knight of the Order of the Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas and the Grand Cross of Commander of the Order of the Cross of Vytis in 1999. In 2000, he received Lithuania’s independence medal.

The conference in Vilnius marked the 35th anniversary of the establishment of the Helsinki Groups, which led to democratic changes in Central and Eastern Europe.

Setting up Helsinki Groups was the idea of famous Russian dissident Andrei Sakharov. These groups explored breaches to the decisions of the 1975 Helsinki Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe and informed world society about them, also the governments of the signatory countries.

The Lithuanian Helsinki Group was formed on 25 November 1976. Among the founders of the Lithuanian Group there were Priest Karolis Garuckas, Ph.D. (Physics) Eitan Finkelstein, poet, teacher and former prisoner Ona Lukauskaitė-Poškienė, former political prisoner Viktoras Petkus and poet, translator Tomas Venclova.