Vytautas Sakalauskas

Who was Vytautas Sakalauskas?

Vytautas Sakalauskas was a Soviet Lithuanian politician who was the last Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic before Lithuanian independence in 1990.

After graduation from Kaunas Polytechnic Institute in 1957, Sakalauskas worked in engineering and transportation departments of various communist institutions until 1969. He joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1960. From 1969 to 1983, he was a member of the Vilnius branch of the Lithuanian Communist Party, becoming branch's first secretary in 1974. Sakalauskas was elected to the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union in 1974 and the Supreme Soviet of the Lithuanian SSR in 1976. From 1985 to 1990, he was the Chairman of the Council of Ministers.

Sakalauskas was not re-elected to the Supreme Soviet in the parliamentary elections in 1990 and largely retired from Lithuanian politics. He headed Soviet trade mission in Maputo, Mozambique. In preparation for the events of January 1991, KGB brought Sakalauskas to Moscow in an attempt to recruit him for the planned coup by the National Salvation Committee. Sakalauskas was offered to head the planned pro-Moscow government, but he refused and returned to Mozambique. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, he returned to Lithuania and worked in private sector.