Lithuanian who spied for Lukashenka's regime sued the President of Lithuania because he was not exchanged for Belarusian political prisoners

Mantas Danelius. Photo from his Facebook

As the Lithuanian national publication LRT reports, next week the Regional Administrative Court will begin hearing an unprecedented complaint. Mantas Danelius, an inmate of Pravieniškės-2 prison, is demanding 100,000 euros in compensation for moral damages from the Chancellery of Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda. The reason for such indignation was the responses from the presidential administration regarding the initiation of an exchange with Belarus, which seemed unsatisfactory to the convicted spy.

Danelius's desire to leave the Lithuanian prison quickly is completely understandable. Back in May of last year, 2025, he appealed to Gitanas Nausėda with a demand to immediately initiate his exchange for Lithuanian citizens held in Belarusian colonies. He argued his position by stating that the country's Criminal Code provides for the president's role in such procedures.

However, the bureaucratic machine of a democratic state operates according to strict procedures, not at the whim of a convict. The President's Chancellery explained that the spy's complaint would not be recognized because his letters did not even indicate that he was asking specifically for a pardon, which is the basic legal step for any exchange.

Danelius himself complains to journalists that the prison administration refuses to negotiate with foreign embassies due to a lack of authority, and his own lawyer is afraid to contact diplomats because of possible persecution by the Lithuanian State Security Department.

Danelius was an ordinary informant who, from July 2022 to February 2023, served the interests of Belarusian propagandist Ksenia Lebedeva, who is closely associated with the special services.

Abusing the trust of the Belarusian diaspora in Vilnius, he infiltrated opposition organizations, collected information about their funding, projects, and personal data of activists, thereby posing a direct threat to people who had fled terror. His most cynical operation was a meeting with a former volunteer of the Kastuś Kalinoŭski Regiment: Danelius convinced the fighter that he was acting in the interests of the US Embassy, secretly recorded the conversation, and sent it to Minsk. In May 2025, the Lithuanian Court of Appeal put an end to his case, upholding the nine-year prison sentence.

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