Poland to demolish about 500 Soviet monuments
UAToday: Russia’s Foreign Ministry compares removal to ISIL’s destruction in Palmyra
Poland plans to demolish about 500 Soviet monuments throughout the country like this one in Warsaw. Polish authority wants to remove all reminders of Soviet invasion and subsequent decades-long political dominance from the streets.
The decision was announced by the Institute of National Remembrance. It’s responsible for investigating crimes against the Polish nation. According to the head of the Institute, the preservation of the monuments was “a fatal mistake” and they should have been demolished in the early 1990s. Polish authority also announced the streets connected with the Communist past of the country must disappear from the Polish cities.
But Polish government will continue to care for the graves of the Soviet soldiers located in Poland.
Andrzej Zawistowski, head of the department of the Institute of national remembrance: “It’s hard to imagine how a monument to Hitler, Goering or other Nazi criminals can stand in Europe. Why should the monuments to Lenin stand? He also had blood on his hands and built a totalitarian state, which lasted much longer than Hitler’s one. This is one reason. Another one is that we want to be masters of our land and decide what we want to do.”
Read also Ukrainian Ministry of Culture gives way to demolishing about 800 Soviet monuments
Each removal of Soviet monuments brings a new round of angry statements from the Russian officials. They accuse Poland of erasing history and threaten the removals “won’t remain unanswered.”
Maria Zakharova, Russia’s Foreign Ministry Spokesperson: “We have just spoken about how ISIS terrorists planted mines inside the monuments of Palmyra. They did this for ideological reasons. The Polish authorities express a desire to tear down memorials to Soviet soldiers for precisely ideological reasons. We demand the preservation of history and its symbols. The authorities in Warsaw should understand that the implementation of plans for a large-scale demolition of Red Army memorials will not go unanswered.”
Read also Google Maps replaces Soviet place names in Ukraine
Poland is not backing down. The monuments are set to be removed by the next year and transferred to museums to become a “witness of hard times.”
*** Going back to 2015:
FILE – In this April 30, 2001 file photo taken in Pieniezno, Poland, graffiti reading “Murderer”, “Shame” and others is seen on the memorial to Soviet General Ivan Chernyakhovsky, who is considered a symbol of the imposition of communism in Poland, but a national hero in Russia. Russian authorities are threatening serious consequences over the gradual dismantling of the monument that started on Thursday, Sept.17, 2015. (AP Photo/Wojtek Jakubowski) POLAND OUT
****
WARSAW, Poland (AP) — In a new dispute exposing the complexity of Poland’s relations with Russia, Moscow is threatening Warsaw with “most serious consequences” for dismantling a monument to a Soviet World War II general.
The removal of the 1970s memorial to Gen. Ivan Chernyakhovsky began Thursday in the northern town of Pieniezno, where the general died of wounds in February 1945. He is buried in Russia.
Local authorities argue that Chernyakhovsky crushed units of Poland’s clandestine Home Army during the war and also symbolizes the imposition of communism on Poland.
Poland’s ambassador has been summoned to the Foreign Ministry in Moscow, while Russia’s embassy in Warsaw has issued a “strong protest” and has expressed “deep indignation” over the dissembling of the concrete-and-metal memorial, which it called a “blasphemous act.”
The statement said that Russia has “warned the Polish side many times” that removing such monuments cannot continue “without the most serious consequences.” It did not specify the consequences.
Poland’s Foreign Minister Grzegorz Schetyna insisted Friday that the action is in line with bilateral agreements.
The authorities in Pieniezno want to send Charnyakhovsky’s monument to Russia, where he is a national hero. The Red Army’s role, along with the Allies, in defeating Nazi Germany remains a source of deep national pride in Russia. Some 600,000 Russian troops lost their lives fighting the Nazis on Polish territory. But in Poland the Red Army is associated with the brutal oppression that followed and cost thousands of lives.
The dispute comes as ties are strained over the conflict in Ukraine, where pro-Russian insurgents are waging a separatist struggle. Poland says Moscow is supporting the rebels.
