Victory Day in Berlin

Every year on May 9, thousands of people come to Berlin. Celebrating the Victory Day is a tribute to the memory of the liberators, the heroes of the Great Patriotic War (1941-1945).

The celebrations of Victory Day in Berlin began in the morning, in Treptow Park, where a huge number of people gathered. The weather was beautiful, the bright sun, green trees, the springtime twitter of birds. The memorial to Soviet soldiers in Treptow Park, was opened in 1949, and it is the largest Soviet military memorial built outside the territory of the Soviet Union. More than 7,000 Soviet soldiers were buried here. During the Berlin Offensive Operation (April 16-May 8, 1945) more than 78,000 Soviet military men were killed and more than 274,000 wounded.

The Soviet military memorial in Treptow Park, Berlin, photo WEB

12-meter monument of the warrior liberator, holding a little girl, according to the plan of the sculptor E.V. Vuchetich (1908 - 1974), is the final part of the triptych "Sword of Victory". The first sculptural composition, symbolizing the Soviet rear, without which victory in this terrible war would have been impossible, is in Magnitogorsk and is called the Rear - Front Memorial.

The second monument is Motherland Calls! One of the most famous Soviet memorials dedicated to the Great Patriotic War, was installed on the Mamayev Hill in Volgograd, the former Stalingrad, where in 1943 was a radical change in the course of the war. The third sculpture is the Warrior Liberator, located in Treptow Park, Berlin, depicts a Soviet soldier who cuts a swastika with one hand and holds the rescued girl with the other hand. The war is over, the enemy is defeated and involuntarily recalled the words of Prince Alexander Nevsky - "Whoever comes with a sword to us will perish from the sword!"

Triptych "Sword of Victory", photo WEB

The ceremony was opened with a minute of silence. Then the heads and representatives of the diplomatic missions of Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and other foreign states, as well as representatives of the German government, the Berlin Senate, political parties and public organizations laid flowers and climbed the mound on which the monument stands.

Minute of silence at the mass grave, photo © Giulia Ilina

The solemn event was attended by Ambassador of the Russian Federation in the Federal Republic of Germany S.Y. Nechaev, President of the "Union of Veterans of the Forces Group in Germany" Colonel-General A. V. Terentyev, Archbishop Tikhon Podolsky, administrator of the Berlin-German Diocese, the first German to be in space, Sigmund Jähn, a cosmonaut from the GDR.

Laying flowers at the Memorial to Soviet soldiers in Treptow Park, photo © Giulia Ilina

There was a huge number of people, many children. People carried a continuous stream of flowers. Flags were everywhere, many people were with photographs of relatives, participants of the Great Patriotic War.

Further, the official delegation paid tribute to the memory of the mass grave where the poems of Robert Rozhdestvensky were sung in the shadow of the birches: "Remember! Centuries later, in a year, remember! About those who will never come again, remember! ".

Veterans of of the Great Patriotic War, photo © Giulia Ilina

The second part of the ceremony was held near the memorial to the fallen Soviet soldiers in the Tiergarten, located in the heart of Berlin, a few hundred meters from the Reichstag and the Brandenburg Gate. This monument of the sculptor L.E. Karbel (1917-2003) was erected in 1945 in memory of the Soviet soldiers who fell in the battles of the Second World War. More than 2,000 Soviet military men were buried here. Near the monument are two T-34-76 tanks and two ML-20 howitzer, a testimony of the battle for Berlin.

Since the territory of the memorial was in the zone of the former British occupation sector of Berlin, it was practically a Soviet enclave, and at the monument stood a solemn guard of Soviet soldiers until 1994, when the final withdrawal of Soviet troops from Germany was. By the way, close to the monument on the asphalt pavement is a picture of smiling US president, R. Reagan, and the phrase "Mr. Gorbachev, take down this wall!" is written. Indeed, Berlin is a crossroads of the complex history of the twentieth century.

Memorial to the fallen Soviet soldiers in the Tiergarten, photo © Giulia Ilina

On May 9, in the same area at the Brandenburg Gate was an action "Immortal Regiment", in which many people took part. The Great Patriotic War tragically changed the fate of every Soviet family, leaving a bloody trace of millions of deaths and wounds, destroyed cities and burnt villages, crippled human destinies. But the memory of the heroes of this terrible war is alive, and their descendants bear with pride the portraits of warriors and lay flowers on their graves ...

Sobibor

In the evening of May 9, 2018, there was the premiere screening of a feature film Sobibor (issue of 2018), directed by K. Khabensky. It is dedicated to the tragic events of 1943: the terrible suffering of the Sobibor concentration camp's prisoners and the heroic escape, organized by the Soviet man Alexander Pechersky. The audience was welcomed by the Ambassador of the Russian Federation to the Federal Republic of Germany S.Y. Nechaev and actor K. Khabensky.

Premiere of the film "Sobibor", photo © Giulia Ilina

This film is about the terrible time of the Second World War and its inhumane genocide of Jews is the crucial moment of reflection for modern people about good and evil, conscience, courage and responsibility. Our responsibility is a world without war.

Giulia Ilina, Germany, Berlin

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