As Vladimir Putin basks in a new warm glow of normalising relations with Washington, in a small corner of Ukraine a city taken by Russian soldiers is erasing Ukrainian history by opening a museum honouring ruthless figures from Soviet history.
The Ukrainian city of Mariupol fell to Putin’s invading Russian forces after fierce fighting in May 2022, and has been occupied by Moscow troops ever since.
Images taken during and after the brutal battle showed civilian apartment buildings across the urban landscape burned and destroyed. The population plummeted from just over 420,000 to around 120,000 as many civilians fled the fighting and destruction.
Now, in the ruins of a once peaceful Ukrainian settlement, a new installation has reportedly been opened to celebrate figures from Russian history.
According to the Ukrainian news site Telegraf, the museum features an area dedicated to a man known as Joseph Stalin’s « propagandist-in-chief », Andrei Zhdanov.
The rotund Soviet Central Committee member, with a Hitler-like moustache, was known for his part in the Great Purge, the name given to the Communist Party attack on anyone it deemed a political opponent from 1936 to 1938.
It’s estimated up to 1.2 million people, in both Russia and Ukraine, were either executed or died later, having been imprisoned in the horrendous conditions of the Soviet gulag detention system.
Zhdanov, who was a close friend of the Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, has now seemingly been honoured in the new facility in occupied Ukraine.
Boris Piotrovsky, the Russian vice-governor of St. Petersburg for Culture, announced the new exhibit on his Telegram Channel,
The new Zhdanov Museum in Mariupol has been made a branch of the Museum of the Defence and Siege of Leningrad, according to Mr Piotrovsky.
He proudly trumpeted the opening, writing: « It’s great that for the first time a branch of a St. Petersburg institution has opened in our sister city of Mariupol.
« The museum… will become a new cultural and educational center – we will develop it together, hold many events for both adults and the younger generation. »
The Ukrainian publication, the Telegraf, did not share Mr Piotrovsky’s enthusiasm, and noted: « In occupied Mariupol, Russian authorities have opened a museum of Andrei Zhdanov, a Soviet party figure and associate of Joseph Stalin.
« This is yet another example of how Russian authorities are trying to rewrite history by glorifying executioners and ideologists of terror. »
The Telegraf added that « institutes of Ukrainian history and Ukrainian literature, creative unions, editorial boards of newspapers and magazines, as well as outstanding figures of Ukrainian culture were criticised » during Zhdanov’s time as the Secretary of the Communist Party.
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