Russian Communists start campaign to put country’s vast collection of Lenin statues & busts on UNESCO World Heritage list
On what would have been the 151st birthday of Soviet revolutionary Vladimir Lenin, the leader of the Communists of Russia party has appealed to the UN and UNESCO to put monuments of the politician on the cultural heritage list.
Speaking to TV channel 360, Maksim Suraykin expressed his opinion that Lenin was “one of the greatest thinkers on the planet” and “changed the course of history for the better.”
“Thanks to him, there are still eight socialist countries. The largest is China, which is almost a quarter of the world’s population,” Suraykin said.
The Communists of Russia are a small political party, with no seats in either house of parliament. Founded in 2009 and officially registered in 2012 as an alternative to the much better-known Communist Party of the Russian Federation, members believe that they represent true Marxism, with its older rival having moved away from far-left ideas.
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Lenin, born in 1870, was a revolutionary who helped lead the Russian Revolution and overthrow the ruling royal family. He is known as the father of the Soviet Union, and was the country’s first-ever leader. Nowadays, almost every town and city in Russia has a monument to Lenin, generally located in the central square. According to Russian newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets, in 2003, there were around 1,800 statues and up to 20,000 busts of the revolutionary.
UNESCO is an agency of the United Nations, and maintains a list of World Heritage Sites, chosen for their cultural, historical, scientific, or other significance. There are currently 869 cultural sites on the list, including 18 from Russia. The Kremlin and Red Square were inscribed in 1990.
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