MINSK, 9 May (BelTA) – After taking part in Victory Day festivities in Pobedy Square in Minsk on 9 May Belarus President Aleksandr Lukashenko talked to reporters about the history of the veteran, next to whom he was sitting as he watched the military parade in Moscow earlier that day, BelTA has learned.
The head of state was in Red Square in Moscow in the morning on 9 May to see a parade in honor of the 79th anniversary of the Victory in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945. He watched it next to the veteran Yekaterina Yevdokimova. Aleksandr Lukashenko was caught on camera while adjusting the hood of her jacket: it was snowing and windy in Moscow at that moment.
“She is a person, who fought here, outside Baranovichi. She wounded a German and took him prisoner. She brought him in and a lot of people, villages, and so on were saved,” Aleksandr Lukashenko said.
“When I approached her, she recognized me and started talking fast in order to tell me things. I listened to her. She is 101 years old! I kept sitting there and envying her: she was still on her feet and spry. It was very cold in Moscow. Even more than that. Low air temperature was not the problem. Red Square is like a funnel with lots of wind. I was lucky that [Uzbekistan President Shavkat] Mirziyoyev had brought me a jacket. I could have died of cold without it. It was very cold. And I saw that this woman, a hero, a patriot, virtually our woman… Her jacket was lying nearby. I helped her put it on and buttoned it up. I tried to keep her warm,” the president said.
“101 years old… God bless everyone to live that long! And to have a working brain and stay on your feet,” Aleksandr Lukashenko added.
Yekaterina Yevdokimova volunteered to join the army in November 1941. She was 18 then. She fought as part of the 2nd Air Observation, Warning, and Communications Division in the city of Dmitrov.
The division was disbanded in early 1943 and Yekaterina Yevdokimova was sent to serve as a wireline communication technician to the 2nd Belarusian Front.
As she was trying to fix a broken communication line during a firefight, she met an enemy soldier face to face. Yekaterina did not lose her wits. She wounded the German, took him prisoner, and delivered him to her unit’s headquarters. She was awarded an Order of the Red Star for that.
Thanks to the valuable information the POW provided Belarusian forces liberated two villages outside Baranovichi with minimal losses.
