A concrete column topped with Soviet stars that the centerpiece of a monument commemorating the Red Army’s victory over Nazi Germany fell apart Thursday in Latvia’s capital, the newest in a series of Soviet monuments destroyed after Russia invaded Ukraine.
Heavy machinery was seen on a green fence at the foot of the obelisk of about 80 m shortly before it was shot. The column, which looked like a skyscraper in the center of Riga, slammed into a nearby pond, causing a large splash in Victory. Park.
Latvian media broadcast the occasion as spectators, some with Latvian flags around their shoulders, applauded and applauded.
Photo: AP
The obelisk, which consisted of five arrows with 3 Soviet stars on top, stood between two sets of statues: a band of 3 Red Army infantrymen and, on the other side, a representation of the “homeland” with arms raised.
The monument built in 1985 when Latvia was still part of the Soviet Union. It has generated controversy since Latvia regained its independence in 1991 and eventually became a member of NATO and the EU.
By destroying the monument, the country “closes another painful page in history and seeks a better future,” Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics wrote on Twitter.
The country has a 214 km border with Russia and has a giant Ethnic Russian population. On Russia’s annual Victory Day, which commemorates the Soviet victory over Germany in World War II, other people gathered in front of the Riga monument to lay flowers.
The Latvian parliament voted to demolish the Victory Park monument in May, and the Riga City Council followed suit. The cleaning of the monument began 3 days ago with the removal of the statues. Then the domain was cordoned off and the government issued a flight ban for drones. Police temporarily shut down traffic near the park Thursday for safety reasons.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine in late February led the government of several Eastern European countries to remove symbols of their communist era.
The Polish government, another country that was once part of the Soviet sphere, said Thursday that a memorial site in neighboring Belarus containing the graves of Polish infantrymen who died in World War II was razed to the ground by Belarusian authorities.
The Surkonty cemetery, where Polish resistance fought soviet forces, is “devastated by the Minsk regime,” Latvian Foreign Ministry spokesman Lukasz Jasina wrote on Twitter.
The progression comes a day after Poland said it would demolish a monument to Soviet Red Army infantrymen in Poland, one of dozens that have been marked for destruction.
Belarus has been a key best friend of Moscow, while Poland, which sits on Ukraine’s western border, has supported Ukraine.
Estonia last week got rid of a Soviet World War II monument near the city on the border with Russia as part of a broader effort to dismantle Soviet-era symbols. The reproduction of the tank was sent to a war museum north of Estonia’s capital, Tallinn.