Ceremony to reinter 852 Red Army soldiers held in Minsk

MINSK, 10 May (BelTA) – A ceremony to reinter 852 Red Army soldiers found on the territory of the former Nazi concentration camp for prisoners of war Stalag-352 took place in Minsk on 10 May, BelTA has learned.

In May 2016, when Belarus celebrated the 71st anniversary of the Victory over the Nazi invaders, field search operations were completed on the grounds of the former Nazi concentration camp for prisoners of war Stalag-352 on Lynkova Street in Minsk. Thanks to Lieutenant Colonel Sergei Oleinikov, an unknown burial place from the Second World War was found on the site of Stalag-352. The first ceremony to reinter 147 Red Army soldiers took place on 1 July 2016.

In 2020, during the following field search operations, a unit of the 52nd search battalion discovered and exhumed bone remains of 144 Red Army soldiers.

The second burial ceremony of 144 Red Army soldiers was held on 17 June 2022. In 2022, bone remains belonging to 852 soldiers were discovered and exhumed. They were captured and ended up in Stalag at the very beginning of the war: between the summer and autumn of 1941 and 1942. The date was established thanks to the discovered medallions. They were issued to soldiers of the regular army from March 1941 to November 1942. The medallion had sealed capsule with the personal information of the soldier: name, surname, year and place of birth, the name of the unit. 46 medallions found; the information about 11 dead was retrieved.

Students from Minsk and the department for perpetuating the memory of Fatherland defenders and war victims of the Armed Forces managed to find relatives of the dead Red Army soldiers in Belarus, Russia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan.