Remember the fallen in the name of the living

In the opening ceremony of the mass grave of peaceful citizens of the city of Stavropol tortured by the fascists during the occupation of 1942-1943 students of the Agrarian University took part.

At noon on November 15, the regional center hosted the long-awaited opening of a restored monument located on the territory of the former DOSAAF airfield. It was at this place in the Russian forest of Stavropol that the Hitlerites committed an act of monstrous crime - the mass shooting of civilians, one of the greatest tragedies of the Great Patriotic War.

More than 3,500,000 people were killed here during the occupation of the city by the fascists. During this time in Stavropol German invaders killed more than 5,000 people, almost all of them were civilians, 4,000 of them were Jews.

It is known that the fascists first executed the patients of Stavropol psychiatric hospital, then began to calculate the Jews. People were gathered in the Bazar Square, promising them evacuation. Then they were loaded into trucks and driven outside the city, in the Russian forest they were shot and buried, some were buried alive. Basically, these were women and children.

At the opening of the monument came the relatives of those who died here. Someone hoped to find the cherished names of missing relatives on the black granite slabs. Such a significant event is a warning to the younger generation of Russians about the crimes of Nazism, about the terrible consequences that can occur today, if those who preach racism, xenophobia, national intolerance, anti-Semitism are not stopped in time.

At the opening ceremony of the mass grave in the Russian Forest, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the State of Israel to the Russian Federation Harry Koren, Chief Rabbi of Russia Berl Lazar, President of the Federation of Jewish Communities of Russia Alexander Boroda, the leadership of the Federal Jewish National and Cultural Autonomy were present as well as Yury Kanner, president of the Russian Jewish Congress, Ilya Altman, head of the Christian organization "Even-Ezer", plenipotentiary representatives of the republics of the North Caucasus Federal District, heads of regional national and public associations, media, students, schoolchildren, relatives of the deceased, historians, archivists, local historians and local residents.

Monuments were also opened in Mineralnye Vody and Kislovodsk, in Novoaleksandrovsk, in villages - Arzgir and Bogdanovka of Stepnovsky district, Spasskoe and Shishkino of the Blagodarnoy district, in the village of Nevdakhin of the Trunovsky district to restore and perpetuate the memory of the victims of the Holocaust in Stavropol.

In this important matter, the RJC Foundation, in cooperation with the Holocaust Research Center and local Jewish communities, has joined efforts of federal and regional authorities, the Christian organization Even-Ezer, the Federal Jewish National-Cultural Autonomy, the Project of Names of the Israeli memorial Yad Vashem, surviving witnesses, relatives of the deceased, historians, archivists, local historians. 

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