Monument to Soviet soldiers at Antakalnis cemetery to be demolished in Vilnius

Vilnius city. Archival photoMOSCOW, June 8 The Vilnius City Council decided to demolish the memorial to Soviet soldiers at the Antakalnis Cemetery, where the country's largest burial place for Lithuania's liberators is located, the city council's press service reports. , which initiates the exclusion of six monuments to Soviet soldiers in the capital's cemetery from the register of cultural heritage for their subsequent demolition.In Belarus, they offered Poland and Lithuania to take away Soviet monuments from them «The memorial to Soviet soldiers will not remain at the Antakalnis cemetery in the capital — this is what the city council decided today … At the end of April, the criteria for assessing the values ​​of cultural heritage were changed, after which conditions appeared for the abolition of legal protection for objects that depict symbols, sculptures, images propagandizing the actions of Nazi Germany or the USSR army,» the message says. According to the press service, Vilnius Mayor Remigius Simasius at a city council meeting called the memorial «a militaristic monster that does not correspond to graves.» It is noted that on Monday the Lithuanian Department of Cultural Heritage excluded six stelae depicting Soviet soldiers from the list of protected values. Previously, the complex had a level of regional significance, therefore, in order to demolish the sculpture, it was necessary to change the legal regulations, the press service reports. until the end of this summer…Where the monuments will end up after the demolition — in a museum or elsewhere — will still be decided, but it is clear that they will not remain in the public space of the capital,» the message says.Deputy Fedorov proposed to revoke the recognition of Lithuanian independenceMore than three thousand soldiers of the 3rd Belorussian Front, who died in the summer of 1944 in the battles for liberation, are buried at the Military Memorial on Antakalnis, created in 1951 Vilnius. In total, more than 80 thousand Soviet soldiers who gave their lives in the fight against fascism are buried in the Baltic Republic. Cases of vandalism against Soviet monuments became more frequent after the start of the Russian special operation in Ukraine. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, commenting on the situation with the monuments to Soviet soldiers in Latvia and Lithuania, called what is happening «an international outrage». . What's going on in Poland and the Baltics