Victims of political repression remembered in Babruisk

Some 50 residents of the city of Babruisk came yesterday to local office of the United Civil Party to remember the victims of Soviet political repression.

The event was preceded by the laying of flowers to the monument dedicated to the victims of the Stalin-era Great Purge.

Among others, the activists spoke of their townsmen: writer Barys Mikulich, poet Siarhei Hrakhouski, and Orthodox priest Pavel Seiba. Executed without trial by the KGB in 1937, Pavel Seiba was expected to be beatified. However, Belarus’ current secret police has repeatedly refused to disclose archive documents that are necessary for the procedure.

“The inscription on the stone “To Babruisk residents, victims of groundless repressions” is appalling. It turns out that repressions are admissible, if they are well-grounded,” says Anatol Sanatsenka, editor-in-chief of the Babruiski Kurier independent newspaper.