Oleksandr Feldman, Ukrainian MP prepares to submit a deputy’s inquiry about the investigation of the incident, which took place in the Babyn Yar memorial park (Kyiv) on May 4. Just before the Holocaust and Heroism Remembrance Day, the flag of Israel was burnt down there. The politician wrote about this on his Facebook page.
“It was an expressive gesture indicating quite clear intentions: to depreciate the tragedy of Jewish people, to erase it from the past and the present of Ukraine. Well, people with similar intentions have already come to this city putting up different notices, the text of which is known by everyone: “All Yids of the city of Kiev…”,” Oleksandr Feldman emphasized. “That is why, I will demand the proper investigation of all the vandalism incidents in the Babyn Yar park from the law-enforcement authorities.”
From 2013 to 2016, 126 offences were committed in the Babyn Yar: monuments’ arsons and graffiti of obscene or xenophobic nature. “This means that every 12 days vandals came and continue to come to the park. We don’t know who these people are, and how many of them come. We don’t know their age, their occupation and the reasons attracting them to the places of sorrow and remembrance. And we don’t know this because during 4 years, none of these cases was taken to court. None! Unfortunately, I know very well the typical reaction of law-enforcement officers to similar incidents. On the background of the increasing statistics on grave and the gravest crimes, nobody hurries to deal with “some monuments.” The rise of xenophobia, anti-Semitism and intolerance always causes the increase of the number of crimes of violence. Always! Violence cannot be localized within some social group; it will inevitably spread in the society.”
