Belarus commemorates Khatyn massacre

22 марта 2018

By Elena Bormotova: Today, Belarus remembers and commemorates the terrible tragedy of the times of the Great Patriotic War. On 22 March 1943, the Nazis burned the village of Khatyn in Logoisk District. 149 people were burnt alive, 75 of them were children.

The name of the Belarusian village became a common name for all the burnt villages of the Soviet Union. In Belarus alone, over 9,000 villages and settlements were burnt by the Nazis. And only a small part of them is immortalized here in Khatyn – the only cemetery of burnt villages in the world.

To commemorate the tragedy, a Guard of Honour marched in the village. Today, there were about a thousand people. All of them gathered at a meeting-requiem to honour the memory of every Khatyn resident who was burnt alive. A wreath from the President of the country was laid in memory of the victims of the massacre. Carnations on black granite symbolize the deceased. An all-Belarusian prayer was heard in Khatyn today. The tragedy that occurred 75 years ago is the eternal grief of Belarus.