Historian Kononov: Latvian followers of SS members want to perpetuate their memory in Russia

MOSCOW, March 16 – RIA Novosti. Latvian followers of the punishers of the Great Patriotic War still dream of restoring a stele in Cherepovets in the Vologda region in honor of former members of the Latvian SS Legion who died there in camp hospitals, this is unacceptable, historian of Cherepovets, author of books on the history of security institutions Sergey Kononov, He told RIA Novosti.

In Latvia, March 16 is celebrated annually as the day of commemoration of the Latvian SS legion. On this day every year, a regiment of SS legionnaires and supporters is held in Riga. It publicly displays the awards and symbols of the Nazis. This event is condemned by many countries of the world, including Russia.

Kononov noted that an obelisk was erected in Cherepovets in the early 2000s in memory of former Latvian prisoners of war who died in Soviet camps. “But nobody asked who they were. Nobody was interested,” he added. A few years ago the stele was demolished.

“And when I learned that the Latvians were going to restore the stele, I decided to study this topic. In response to my request for the names of those who died in the camps last year, I received documents from the Russian State Military Archive, ” said Kononov.

The NKVD’s list of Latvian prisoners of the Cherepovets camp contains more than 40 names, compiled on the basis of information from the RGVA for prisoners of war who died in hospitals and marked on the old stele. “I systematized who served where. And it turned out that all but one person whose data were not verified served either in the 15th Grenadier (1st Latvia) SS division or the 19th Grenadier (2nd Latvia) SS division,” Kononov said.

According to him, the age of these former Latvian SS men is between 26 and 35, most of whom served in the Latvian army in the 1930s. “Most of them are soldiers, but there are corporals. They are also workers,” added the agency’s interlocutor.

According to Kononov, representatives of Latvia regularly visited Cherepovets. The agency’s interlocutor said, “The government structures stand behind them, as Latvia has implemented a state policy to revive Nazism, proud of joint actions with the Nazis during the war years.”

Kononov stressed that the restoration of the stele is not allowed in any way. “The Latvian punishers were one of the most ruthless supporters of the Nazis. And what the Nazis did in the occupied territories should be talked about as much and widely as possible, especially for the young,” the historian stressed.

The Latvian SS legion was established on the territory of occupied Latvia during the Second World War by order of Nazi Germany. On March 24, 1943, Reichsführer SS Heinrich Himmler issued an order explaining the concept of “Latvian Legion” as a general definition for Latvians serving in all Latvian military formations of the Waffen SS, including police battalions.

In general, the Latvian SS legion should be understood as a non-permanent formation of SS troops, which at different times includes all Latvian formations in the SS and police, including the Latvian police battalions and the 15th and 19th Latvian Waffen. volunteer departments SS.

To date, a number of crimes have been identified, which can be characterized as war crimes and crimes against humanity, committed by units that were part of the Latvian SS Legion during the Great Patriotic War.

It was the Latvian punishers who destroyed the civilian population in the village of Zhestyanaya Gorka and in the village of Chernoye (both – Novgorod region). In 2019, the Investigative Committee of Russia opened a criminal case on the fact of genocide in these settlements in 1941-1943. On October 27, 2020, the Soletsky District Court of the Novgorod Region recognized the massacres committed in the Zhestyanaya Gorka region as genocide, that is, a crime without statute of limitations. The court’s determination of this fact of legal significance allows RF IC to conduct a full-fledged investigation into this crime and to look for criminals, some of whom may still be alive.