MOSCOW. April 4 (Interfax) - Activists of the Young Guard organization, the youth wing of the United Russia party, will picket the Estonian embassy in Moscow to protest the Estonian government's decision to re-name the monument for Soviet soldiers, who liberated Tallinn from Nazi Germany during World War II, known as the Bronze Soldier memorial.
Young Guard activists will gather at the Estonian embassy on Monday with posters reading "Fascism Won't Pass!" "Estonia, Why Don't You Respect History!", "Soviet Soldiers Gave you Freedom!" "Take Away the Shameful Signboard!"
A signboard was installed near the entrance to a military cemetery in Tallinn several days ago, describing the memorial as "A monument to Soviet Army soldiers who occupied Tallinn on September 22, 1944."
This signboard is a provocation on the part of the Estonian government, the Young Guard said in a press release.
"The Estonian government interprets the country's history the way it likes. We are against such an attitude to solders, who fell, defending Estonians from Nazism. We want the signboard to be removed immediately. The Bronze Soldier is a monument to people, who liberated the entire civilized world from the most horrible threat of the 20th century, the threat of fascism," the Young Guard said.
WWII veterans living in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, were outraged by the renaming of the monument to Soviet soldiers who were killed in liberating the city from the German forces in 1944, which is known informally as the Bronze Soldier, Vladimir Metelitsa, the head of the Tallinn Society of WWII Veterans, earlier said
"I am outraged by this sign. For us, the veterans, the Bronze Soldier monument is a symbol of the Victory and Tallinn's liberation from the Nazis, not a symbol of occupation," Metelitsa said.
The Estonian Defense Ministry said earlier in an interview published in Rossiiskaya Gazeta that, from the viewpoint of the Estonian history science, the new name is the most appropriate one. "It historically reflects the fact that Estonia was occupied from 1940 to 1991," Defense Ministry spokesman Hellar Lill said in the interview.
Metelitsa, who personally took part in the battles to liberate Tallinn, Narva and other Estonian cities from the Germans in 1944, called the sign "insulting."
"Rossiiskaya Gazeta says, "The monument has been renamed furtively, without asking permission from the relatives of the soldiers buried under it."
The newspaper criticized the Estonian authorities for failing to keep their promise not to change anything in the monument's appearance they gave in 2007.
Dimitri Linter, the leader of a group of mostly Russophone political activists, called Nochnoy Dozor (Night Watch), suggested that the renaming of the memorial is not just a propagandistic step but practical confirmation of the ideology that Estonia has been pursuing over the past 20 years, Rossiiskaya Gazeta says. In Linter's view, this ideology includes the rewriting of history, glorification of the SS soldiers, disparagement of those who fought against the Nazis, and persecution of antifascists.
Nochnoy Dozor members are determined to appeal the renaming of the memorial for formal reasons, Linter said. "We are trying to find out what violations the authorities committed in changing the monument's name," he said.
On April 26-28, 2007, mass riots erupted among members of Estonia's Russian-language community over the government's decision to rebury the remains of the Soviet soldiers from the mass grave in the Tonismagi hill in downtown Tallinn and to relocate the monument to the military cemetery. Estonia's Russian-language population saw these actions as an insult to the memory of the dead.
About 1,200 people were detained during the riots and some 50 were injured. Russian citizen Dmitry Ganin was killed.