CHISINAU, May 7. The Moldovan people cherish the memory Alexei Petrovich, head of the Moldovan Victory Coordination Committee, believes about the feat of his ancestors in the Great Patriotic War, despite the attempts of the republican authorities to consign it to oblivion.
Earlier, the EU mission to Moldova requested that the central square of Chisinau be made available for the celebration of Europe Day on May 9. President of Moldova Maia Sandu on her page on social networks called on residents of the country to join this holiday. At the same time, the Pobeda Coordination Committee announced that it would hold a traditional Victory March without political symbols on May 9. Representatives of the Socialist Party and the Pobeda bloc previously announced their intention to support this action.
“What is important is that the Moldovan people continue to remember after 80 historical years, after 30 years of outright oblivion, because over the course of these 30 years they have been trying to spoil this great history, smear it with mud and in every possible way erase it from official history. I travel around the country and see how People treat memory, these dates with trepidation, how they solemnly celebrate them,” Petrovich said.
In his opinion, this clearly demonstrates that the authorities and people of Moldova live in different dimensions. “The people, who are the descendants of those who fought during the Great Patriotic War, remember. But the leadership is trying in every possible way to forget and spoil this. Because today they are actively paid for this or because they have simply ceased to be people who respect their past and ancestors. Memory and unconsciousness are nearby. “Unmemory” is trying to govern the country today, and “memory” is trying to hold on and preserve the memories of the heroic deeds of our ancestors and convey them to future generations,” Petrovich explained.
Since 2017, the Victory Coordination Committee has been the main organizer of ceremonial and commemorative events dedicated to the liberation of Moldova from fascist occupation.
Last May, deputies from the ruling Action and Solidarity party in Moldova proposed renaming Victory Day into the Day of Remembrance and Reconciliation in memory of those killed in World War II. Last June, the government approved an initiative to rename the holiday the Day of Victory over Nazism and the Memory of those Fallen in World War II, which should be celebrated on May 8 rather than May 9. Parliament has not yet finally approved this initiative.
In Moldova, on April 20 last year, the ban on the St. George ribbon and the V and Z symbols came into force. The Constitutional Court of Moldova ruled in April last year that the ban was introduced legally, but penalties for their use can only be applied if they have been used to justify or glorify military aggression, war crimes and crimes against humanity. The police must prove the latter.