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Improvised memorial to victims of May 2014 massacre in Odessa gone

A video from a nearby web camera features the improvised memorial being loaded into a mini-van at around 2.00 am on Sunday night
Flowers at the memorial (archive) Arkhip Vereschagin/TASS
Flowers at the memorial (archive)
© Arkhip Vereschagin/TASS

ODESSA, May 12. /TASS/. Photographs of victims killed in the House of Trade Unions in Odessa on May 2, 2014 have been removed from Kulikovo field in Odessa as have been flowers, candles and wreaths the local people brought there in remembrance of the victims. The site of the improvised memorial was empty on Monday morning, Reporter Internet service said on its website.

"None of the Kulikovo field activists has been seen on the site yet. A video from a nearby web camera features the improvised memorial being loaded into a mini-van at around 2.00 am on Sunday night," Reporter said.

Earlier, Euromaidan activists demanded to remove the improvised memorial from Kulikovo field after the planned act had been negotiated by a regional Interior department and local activists of the Right Sector nationalist organization (declared an extremist organization and banned in Russia), Reporter said, citing its source at the Interior department. The press service of the Right Sector organization in Odessa has denied involvement of its activists in last night's act.

Odessa Tragedy

A total of 48 people died and over 200 were injured in the tragic events that happened in May in Odessa. A sign-up campaign in support of a referendum turned into clashes between nationalist activists of the Right Sector and the Maidan self-defense groups on the one side and federalization supporters on the other side. The clashes resulted in the local House of Trade Unions being set on fire. The investigation carried out by two parliamentary groups and law enforcers hasn't identified the perpetrators to date. The United Nations has classified as ‘inadequate’ the actions by the Ukrainian authorities to investigate last year’s murders in Kiev’s Independence Square and the House of Trade Unions in Odessa.