Activists stage 'Memory Chain' near KGB headquarters in Minsk - in pictures

Euroradio image
Euroradio image

Some 20 opposition activists on 29 October gathered in front of the KGB headquarters in Minsk to stage the 'Memory Chain' action to commemorate the victims of Stalin-era executions. 

Prominent opposition politician Mikalai Statkevich, his wife Maryna Adamovich, film director Volha Nikalaychyk, poet and politician Uladzimir Nyaklyaeu and others stood with lit handles in their hands. The action lasted for 30 minutes. Security agents monitored the rally but did not detain anyone.

In the night of 30 October 1937, over 100 Belarusian intellectuals - mostly literary people - were executed by Stalin's secret police in Minsk. This tragedy is also known as the 'black night of Belarusian literature.'