The official spokesperson of the Lithuanian basketball fans, Mindaugas Reinikis, has issued an open letter condemning all forms of racism. Read the full letter below.
“Further to the incident at the basketball arena on Tuesday 31st July leading to the arrest and subsequent charging of a 36 year old Lithuanian basketball fan on the grounds of racially aggravated abuse the official supporters of the national basketball team of Lithuania from their London base ‘The Queens Head Stratford’, say the following: ‘We wish to make it totally and abundantly clear to the British public, LOCOG, IOC and sport fans all over the world, that we strongly condemn outright all forms of racism or discrimination based on colour, race, sexual orientation or religion.
Basketball is the national sport of Lithuania, it has become part of this tiny nation’s psyche and culture and it has strong loyal and a huge number passionate supporters who follow the team the world over.
Historically Lithuania has suffered at the hands of brutal and fascist regimes in the form of both Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union and its people fully understand the horrific pain and physiological and lasting damage of ethnic discrimination.
The incident on Tuesday in which one of the basketball teams travelling supporters was arrested was totally regrettable and has sent shock waves throughout the tiny nation with its people in total disbelief at such an accusation being levelled at one of its own.
However, the gesture and chanting of this fan and all others was totally misunderstood and misinterpreted by the undercover police officers who made the arrest.
The gesture in question ,the raising of one or two hands up after clapping in this manner’ is a gesture commonly used in Lithuania at sporting events and is in no way meant to represent the ‘Nazi salute’ indeed the very thought of it doing so is totally abhorrent to the Lithuanian supporters.
The 36 year old fan in question is going to vigorously deny the charges and will be lodging a strong defence. In fact the police have now mislaid or lost all together his personal belongings including ID, credit cards, cash, a mobile phone and therefore it is considering legal proceedings against them in due course.
Finally and in conclusion when he tried to attend today’s basketball game against France he was expelled – what has happened to the very basic tennent of British justice?
‘Innocent until proven guilty’!!!”
2nd of August 2012
Official supporters spokesperson
Mindaugas Reinikis, tel: +37062082911, e-mail: reinikis@gmail.com
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Get real Mindaugas and get your heads out of the clouds .. when has making monkey noises and gestures, and doing a nazi salute with your finger over your top lip being misunderstood, this guy even admitted that doing these things is acceptable (whether in his own country or elswhere let me tell you its NOT acceptable and NOT misunderstood)
“A Lithuanian accountant who made Nazi salutes and aimed monkey chants at black players during an Olympic basketball match has insisted such behaviour is acceptable in his home country.
Petras Lescinskas, 36, has been fined £2,500 after he was seen raising his arm several times while placing his other hand over his top lip to imitate Hitler’s moustache.”
“So when an english man comes to Lithuania and pisses on the houses of parliament, do we assume that all english men are unable to urinate in private??? ”
Another disgracefully racist comment made by a Lithuanian only interested in sticking up for a fellow countrymen without actually examining the harsh and disturbing facts.
Maybe you can back up that statement with some official statistics of how many Englishmen have been convicted of urinating on the Seimas over the past 20 years?
Whilst you’re at it perhaps you can dig up some more numbers of how many Englishmen in Lithuania have been convicted of murdering pensioners in their own beds, smashing peoples’ heads open with baseball bats, murdering fellow Englishmen, causing death by dangerous driving, scrounging off the state benefit system, stealing anything they can get their hands on or even blowing themselves up in moonshine factories.
In the mean time I’m off to the Vilnius Jewish Museum to see what they think of my basketball salute.
Ooh ooh ooh eee eee eee aah aah aah!
You started so well and ended so pathetically. Yeah, people do the Nazi salute all the time and unfortunately get misunderstood. Oh, and making monkey noises, that is a Lithuanian thing. What a joke. Lithuania should be banned from the Olympics. It is an irrelevant country full of racists. Please ban it and forget about it.
Clearly a mistake. How could anyone ever think that Lithuanians were xenophobic, homophobic, racists ;
‘the gesture and chanting of this fan and all others was totally misunderstood and misinterpreted by the undercover police officers who made the arrest’.
Reminds me of the frequent monkey noises from the crowd i heard when watching a football match live in Vilnius.
having said that, I doubt the police would be charging him unless he did use racist remarks. and if so, good on the met police and hopefully a lesson learned by the fan who should know that this sort of behaviour is unacceptable.
So when an english man comes to Lithuania and pisses on the houses of parliament, do we assume that all english men are unable to urinate in private???
One man’s actions are in no way a resemblance on the whole nation. if so, then most english football fans would be banned from most games…as they are just as passionate about football as Lithuanians are about basketball.
But the salute is really a gesture that most people use at lithuanian basketball games after clapping and I doubt he was using it as a Nazi salute.
And the moustache gesture with his fingers was…?
Seems like ‘the accountant from Kaunas’ was fined 2000 GBP & therefore deternined as guilty & therefore it was / is perfectly acceptable to exclude him from future games…. this is common with football holigans etc in GB.