Kurapaty defenders frightened away a might-have-been vandal armed with an axe and a hammer not far from the notorious restaurant Let’s Go and Eat on Wednesday evening. Apparently, he was about to destroy the so-called Clinton’s Bench.
The situation was like a real thriller, Pavel Sevyarynets, a co-chairman of the organizing committee of the Belarusian Christian Democracy party, said on Facebook. Activist Pyotr Rabushka who was going home saw a man holding a sledgehammer and фт axe near Clinton’s Bench. When asked about his intentions, the man attempted to chop at Pyotr with his axe, but the activist managed to escape and call his friends.
The bench was presented by U.S. President Bill Clinton who visited Kurapaty in 1994. It has been repeatedly vandalized, but the Belarusian authorities have never traced committers.
Kurapaty, a place on the outskirts of Minsk, is not just the national memorial and a mass grave of the victims of Stalinist repression; since 1993, it has been is a site of historical and cultural heritage. Belarusian president Alyaksandr Lukashenka has never paid tribute to the killed in Kurapaty.
Since late May, the group of Belarusian activists is protesting against ‘dancing on the bones’, i.e.the activity of Let’s Go And Eat restaurant in the vicinity of the mass grave under the passive eye of the local authorities. According to the protesters, its construction and opening at the very place was illegal. Activists first asked the authorities to interfere with the situation, and then decided to act independently. They are trying not to let cars to the territory of the restaurant. The Minsk police have already drawn dozens of protocols against activists who had blocked the restaurant that opened at the site of the massacre.
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СК, belsat.eu
