The village of Kaniūkai is located on the south-eastern edge of the Rūdnininkai Forest, near the current Lithuanian-Belarusian border, on the Šalčios River. In 1920-1939, Kaniūkai belonged to Benekainiai parish of Lida county, Vilnius region under Polish rule. In the autumn of 1943, a local self-defence unit was formed in the village. The self-protectors prevented the Soviet partisans from operating, defended their crops, livestock and property with weapons, and resisted demands to disarm.
Unable to control the situation in south-eastern Lithuania and to suppress the resistance of the armed rural self-guards, the Soviet partisans resorted to a brutal punitive campaign of demonstration. On the night of 29 January 1944, a Soviet partisan detachment, consisting mainly of former Jewish prisoners of the Kaunas ghetto and Soviet prisoners of war, led by Jakovas Prenneris, attacked the village of Kaniūkiai and burned its inhabitants. Over 100 people were killed. Such a massacre was supposed to be a “punishment” for organising self-defence. A cross has been erected in the village of Kaniūkai to commemorate the murdered inhabitants.
