A picket stood outside the FSB headquarters for the Sverdlovsk Region

www.e1.eu, 30.10.2008

On the Day of Remembrance for the Victims of Political Repressions the headquarters of the FSB in the region were picketed by the youth wing of Yabloko. They had notified the city authorities of their intentions and expected one hundred people to take part. They demanded the release of political prisoners, among whom they numbered: Mikhail Khodorkovsky and others detained and imprisoned as part of the Yukos affair; supporters of Eduard Limonov; and bloggers and journalists who have suffered for their convictions.

The Yekaterinburg branch of Memorial held an open day. In the evening a documentary film about Eufrosinia Kersnovskaya was shown. She spent more than ten years in Stalin’s labour camps and, on her release, wrote her memoirs, How much is a person worth?

In Krasnoturinsk a memorial plaque was unveiled during a rally at the entrance to the Bogoslovskaya power station, commemorating the prisoners of Bogoslovlag. The inscription on black marble reads: “During the construction of this power station the labour of innocent captives of the Gulag was used. Remember: every kilowatt of electricity has been paid with their life and liberty”.

Official events in which the city authorities took part were held in Yekaterinburg at the end of last week. A requiem mass was held by the memorial to the victims of political repression at the 12th kilometre on the Moscow highway. A commemorative supper was organised in the city administration.

Today more than six thousand rehabilitated victims of political repression live in Yekaterinburg and more than two thousand others who have shared a similar fate.