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21 Jun 2020

Lukashenko opens reconstructed memorial at site of burned-down village

Lukashenko opens reconstructed memorial at site of burned-down village

SVETLOGORSK DISTRICT, 21 June (BelTA) – Belarus President Aleksandr Lukashenko took part in a ceremony on 21 June to open the memorial complex Ola at the site of the village of Ola, which was burned down by the Nazi during World War Two, BelTA has learned.

During the ceremony Aleksandr Lukashenko noted that the year of the 75th anniversary had become the year to recall the memory of the tragic fate of the Belarusian nation. “Starting with the memorial church where we lit a candle to victims and heroes of the Great Patriotic War on the eve of 9 May, we continue walking the road of sorrow in the wake of the cruel crimes committed by the Nazi. We visited the village of Borki yesterday. Today we are here, at the site of the burned-down village of Ola. Tomorrow we will be in Brest to recall the heroes, who were the first line of defense against the invaders,” the president said.

Aleksandr Lukashenko continued: “Today when the feat of our nation is doubted, we do everything to make see the truth those, who still believe that Hitler was trying to bring a civilization to the Slavs. Belarusians, Ukrainians, and Russians were not humans in the eyes of the enemy. The Nazi came into our lands upon the Fuhrer’s orders in order to find the human resources to till fields and feed the great German empire.”

Aleksandr Lukashenko stated that the resistance the invaders faced became fatal for civilians. The Nazi troops responded with murders and atrocities in order to break the spirit of disobedience.

“Nearly 2,000 people, more than half of them were kids, were burned alive here, in the village of Ola which became the last refuge for residents of the nearby villages. It is nearly 12 Khatyns! [Khatyn was another Belarusian village burned down by the Nazi]” Aleksandr Lukashenko stressed.

Residents of more than 5,000 Belarusian villages were slaughtered like that. Of them 186 villages have not been revived.

The German army occupied the village of Ola in late July 1941. In the morning of 14 January 1944 a German punitive force assisted by an army unit of about 1,000 troops surrounded the village. People were herded into the houses, which were then set ablaze. Those trying to run away were gunned down. Still alive, some were dragged into the fire. As many as 1,758 civilians were shot and burned like that, including 950 kids. The village of Ola was not revived after the war. In 1958 a monument – a kneeling soldier with a wreath – was erected at the communal grave where the civilians and Soviet soldiers are buried (a total of 2,253 people).

The communal grave has been reconstructed to create the memorial complex Ola. It includes an entrance zone, a commemorative zone (in the area adjacent to the existing communal grave) and a footpath to connect the two zones along a former village street. A symbolic cross and a bell have been placed in the center of the commemorative zone. There is a bell tower nearby. It has been made to look like a village barn and contains a number of bells to match the number of villages, whose residents died there.

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