Russians honour false Soviet ‘war hero’ suspected of genocide
Oct 26, 2018
Estonian Life No. 43 2018
A memorial to a Soviet Army WWII veteran, with fraudulent credentials as a war hero, was unveiled in Pskov Oblast, the Russian-annexed Estonian county of Pihkva on September 21. The memorial calls for those at the memorial to bow their heads to honour the ‘immortal deeds of a hero’.
He was actually Estonian – Arnold Meri – who not only misled people about his battlefront heroics, but was also charged with crimes against humanity by Estonian authorities. In fact a criminal investigation by KAPO was initiated in 1995. The accusations were serious. He was alleged to have led the mass 1949 deportations in Hiiumaa.
The government prosecutor involved stated that they had irrefutable evidence that Meri had directed the preparations for the deportations and had assisted the NKVD to execute the planned deportations to Siberia. Appointed by the Communist Party to co-ordinate the arrest and removal of targeted families, he arrived in Hiiumaa a week before the designated March 25 date of the operation.
Court proceedings to consider the charges commenced on March 20, 2008. Meri died in 2009 before the case was concluded. He had acknowledged his role in the mass deportations, but did not consider his role to have been significant. Some 80 witnesses had been scheduled to present evidence against Meri.
The unveiling of the memorial stone in ‘Pihkva’ was supported by the Russian government through the local government. Not surprisingly the term ‘fascist’ is used in the text on the memorial in describing the enemy. Arnold Meri was a lifetime leading member of the ‘anti-fascist’ movement in Estonia, a group that would parrott Kremlin propaganda and promote labeling anybody as a ‘fascist’ who dared to challenge Moscow’s fabrications of history. (Read more: Estonian Life No. 43 2018)
Laas Leivat, Toronto
