The mayor of the Polish town of Pieniezno is asking regional authorities to permit the dismantling of a local monument to a Soviet Army World War II general.
General Ivan Chernyakhovsky was one of the leaders of the Soviet
campaign against Nazi Germany. He died in February 1945 after
suffering a lethal wound in combat.
The monument had been erected near the spot of General
Chernyakhovsky's death in 1970.
Some in Poland refer to Chernkyakhovsky as the ‘Executioner of
the Home Army’. The Home Army was the main Polish resistance
movement during the World War II Nazi occupation. The head of
Poland’s Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom
Sites accuse Chernyakhovsky of taking part in the elimination of
the local Home Army command structure.
The Council argues that the existence of a monument to him goes
against Polish “national interests”, local media
report.
The final decision on whether to remove the monument will be
taken at the end of May.
The Polish side is proposing that once the monument is
dismantled, it should be moved to Russia. The other option
authorities are considering is to place it in a Soviet military
graveyard.
“If the Russian side will not negotiate, then it is possible
that the monument will be placed in one of the storages. As for
Poles, this object is equivalent to scrap metal,” the town’s
mayor was quoted as saying by wPolityce TV.
In the past there have been numerous documented instances of this
monument being vandalized.
Russia has repeatedly spoken out against plans to eliminate the
monument and considers the proposal to transfer the monument
“unreasonable”. Moscow insists on holding joint
consultations in line with the 1994 Agreement between two
countries on the graves and places dedicated to the memory of
victims of war and repression.
General Chernyakhovsky was the youngest Soviet front commander,
twice Hero of the Soviet Union and Commander of the 3rd
Belorussian Front. He died from wounds received outside
Konigsberg, now Kaliningrad, at the age 38.
The Times magazine called him the “iron-muscled and iron-willed”
young general.
According to his relatives the news of his death prompted Winston
Churchill to send a message of condolences to Joseph Stalin.
Chernyakhovsky was buried in Vilnius, Lithuania but after the
fall of USSR his remains were reburied at the Novodevichy
Cemetery in Moscow.