Salute the Red Army heroes

by New Worker correspondent

NCP leader Andy Brooks and NCP London organiser Theo Russell joined Italian comrades over the remembrance weekend to pay tribute to the Soviet people who fought and died to defeat the Nazis in the Second World War. Called by the supporters of the Communist Front of Italy in Britain, comrades laid flowers during the small ceremony at the Soviet War Memorial in the shadow of the Imperial War Museum in Southwark on Saturday.
    In the past Russian diplomats and those from other former Soviet republics would have joined local dignitaries, members of the Russian community in London and representatives of the Armed Forces and veterans’ associations in honouring the fallen at an annual Remembrance Day ceremony organised by the Soviet War Memorial Trust. This has now all ended because of the Ukraine war.
    Soon after the fighting began Sir Simon Hughes, the former constituency Liberal-Democrat MP who was once a frequent attender at these events, said that the Victory Day event at the Soviet War Memorial should not include Russia and Belarus unless Russian troops withdrew from Ukraine by 1st May. To avoid the memorial becoming a focus for protests and possible vandalism, the Trust has now sadly suspended all commemorations at the monument. But individuals and small groups continue to pay their respects at the Soviet war memorial.
    Fresh red carnations were already lying the foot of the sombre bronze statue when the London and Italian comrades arrived. They weren’t the first. They certainly won’t be the last…