Finnish city removes Soviet gift
The last monument to Russian revolutionary leader and the founder of the country’s Bolshevik communist party, Vladimir Lenin, has been removed in Finland. City authorities in the southeastern port city of Kotka relocated the bust to a local museum.
On Tuesday, construction workers hoisted the bronze off its pedestal and drove it away to its final destination.
According to Finnish broadcaster YLE, citing Kotka museum director Kirsi Niku, the effigy was designed and created in the then-Estonian Soviet republic and was gifted by Tallinn to the Finnish city in 1979.
Such gestures of friendship were quite common at the time.
The bust was located in a park in Kotka near a wooden house where the Bolshevik party founder had presumably visited.
The monument had been targeted by vandals several times over the years, before the city council opted to remove it.
The authorities made the decision amid pressure from local residents, AP reported.
Following the start of Russia’s offensive in Ukraine in late February, a number of European nations removed Soviet-era monuments in protest at Moscow’s actions.
As for Lenin, he was exiled in Finland on several occasions when it was still an autonomous Grand Duchy within the Russian Empire.
The Nordic nation declared independence in late 1917 following the Russian Revolution. Lenin and the Bolshevik leadership recognized it soon thereafter.
