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Police continue probing vandal attack on Clinton Bench in Kurapaty

The Minsk district police department continues investigating the most recent vandal attack on Clinton Bench, a granite monument in the Kurapaty Stalin-era massacre site just outside Minsk, despite deciding against instituting criminal proceedings over the incident in mid-February.

According to historian Ihar Kuznetsow who complained to the police about the attack, the investigator once again questioned him and other people who discovered the damage on January 30 when arriving at Kurapaty to commemorate victims of the Stalin terror, told BelaPAN.


He said that he had urged the officer to look for the offenders among ultra-nationalist activists, not homeless people or criminals. "I once again draw his attention to the fact that the attack was not an accidental but malicious act," the historian said.


When refusing to open a criminal case, the police cited failure to detect any elements of crime. They also said that Clinton Bench had not been put on any official register of memorials or property and that is why it was impossible to estimate how much the memorial and the damage were worth.

Unidentified people smashed the bench and took away a piece of it in what was said to be the 11th vandal attack on Clinton Bench that was donated by President Bill Clinton on behalf of the people of the United States during his visit to Belarus in 1994.

The previous one occurred two months ago. The vandals then threw the bench's granite slab off the concrete supports and scattered flowers and candles placed on the monument.