MOSCOW, April 8. /TASS/. Russian presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov has slammed Latvia’s plans to demolish war-time memorials as a national disgrace.
Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) said earlier that Latvian authorities plan to remove all World War II memorials in the country in a bid to spoil the celebration of the 80th victory anniversary.
"To show such blatant disrespect for the memory of those who saved your country from Nazism — that is a national disgrace. And it’s a tragedy for any people to turn against their own past," Peskov said.
According to the SVR, Latvia plans to "remove about one-third of the monuments erected over the mass graves of Soviet liberators as soon as possible." "A ‘search team’ has been contracted to carry out this macabre plan, a group whose leadership has allegedly agreed, for a 'reasonable' fee, to desecrate the graves and falsify excavation records to show no signs of burial," it added.