Museums and memorials

The Partisans is a 1979 sculpture by the Polish-American sculptor Andrzej Pitynski that has been exhibited in various places around Boston since 1983. The sculpture depicts the "cursed soldiers" – anti-communist Polish partisans who fought against the communist regime following the communist takeover of Poland in the aftermath of World War II. 8000 partisans were killed, around 5000 were sentenced to death and another 21 000 underground fighters died in prisons and camps. The monument is dedicated to freedom fighters worldwide. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Wende Museum of the Cold War is a museum, historical archive and educational institution in California. "Wende" is a German word that translates into English as “transformation.” It commonly refers to the era of uncertainty and possibility leading up to the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. The museum's collection is the largest of its kind in the world, containing over 100 000 relics from the Cold War period. The museum's archive of contemporary witnesses also contains numerous audio-visual files and interviews with citizens from the former Eastern Bloc. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The memorial was built to honour the millions of victims of the Ukrainian Famine-Genocide of 1932–33 and educate the American public. The man-made famine in Ukraine was engineered and implemented by Stalin's totalitarian regime. The grain field motif on the bronze bas-relief symbolises the peasantry as the main victims of the famine catastrophie. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The sculpture commemorates all those who were either expelled or forced to flee their homes as a result of the Yalta Conference in 1945. The monument replaced a previous memorial from 1982 that had been repeatedly damaged by vandalism. The creation of the original memorial was opposed by both the government of the Soviet Union and the Foreign Office. An inscription on the memorial dedicates the monument to countless people from the Soviet Union and other East European states who were imprisoned and died at the hands of communist governments after being repatriated at the conclusion of the Second World War. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The idea to erect a monument came from a physician Madeleine Cuendet, who organised aid for Czechoslovak refugees Switzerland after the suppression of the Prague Spring of 1968. When she learned of the self-immolations of Jan Palach and Jan Zajics, she attempted to build a monument to both of them. However, the idea was met with resistance and the implementation was delayed by almost 30 years. After the Velvet Revolution of 1989, the idea for a monument resurfaced and implementation began with the support of the Czech Embassy and other associations. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A former political prisoner Cicerone Ionițoiu proposed to the exiled Romanians living in France that a monument be erected in Paris in honour of the Romanians executed in their homeland by the communist regime. The granite tomb reads: "1944-1989. The Romanians who died for God and democracy. The exiled Romanians." Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Cenotaph for Imre Nagy was inaugurated at the Père Lachaise Cemetery on the 30th anniversary of Nagy's death. Imre Nagy was a Hungarian politician who in 1956 became a leader of the Hungarian Revolution against the Soviet-backed government, for which he was executed two years later. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The monument project was initiated by the Ukrainian Canadian Congress Volunteer Group. Its Regina branch purchased an exact copy of the life size bronze sculpture located near the entrance to the National Holodomor Museum in Kiev, Ukraine. The monument commemorates Holodomor, a man-made famine in the Soviet ruled Ukraine, endured by the Ukrainian people in 1932-33. During the famine millions of Ukrainians died of starvation. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The monument was the first Holodomor marker erected in Canada. It was unveiled on the 50th anniversary of the Holodomor, the genocidal famine in Ukraine. It is located in front of Edmonton’s city hall. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The museum houses several multimedia exhibition galleries dedicated to various modules covering the complex issue of human rights. Focusing on Canadian society, various perspectives of indigenous peoples on human rights are discussed as well as violations of ethnic rights throughout history. Canada's Ukrainian community in exile also participated in the public discussion of how the museum should be conceived. Consequently, Holodomor - the catastrophic famine of 1932/33 in Ukraine - was recognised as a genocide and featured in the museum. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The exhibition focuses on European history in the 19th and 20th centuries. As a cultural institution and exhibition centre, the House of European History intends to promote the understanding of European history and European integration through a permanent exhibition and temporary and travelling expos. The exhibition critically reflects on the implication of past events on the present day and juxtaposes the contrasting historical experiences of European people. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

In 4 November 1956, the Red Army began the violent suppression of the Hungarian Revolution. Around 200 000 Hungarians fled the country as a result. On the Austrian-Hungarian border, a small bridge over the Einser Canal served as an escape route to freedom for about 70 000 people. On 21 November 1956, the small wooden bridge was blown up by Hungarian border guards. The revolution in Hungary was violently suppressed by the brutal intervention of the Soviet military. The bridge has since been reconstructed to commemorate the uprising and the solidarity between Hungarians and Austrians. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A Memorial for the victims of Katyn mass murder in 1940 and the disaster near Smolensk in 2010, in which Poland's President Lech Kaczynski and 95 other members of his delegation died. The group was on their way to honour the Polish officers murdered by the Soviet National Commisariat for Internal Affairs on the 70th anniversary of genocide in Katyn. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A monument commemorating the victims of mass murder of Polish officers by Soviet forces in 1940. The memorial was initiated by the Polish Ex-Servicemen's Association in Australia under the patronage of the president of the Polish government-in-exile, which had been based in London since the Second World War and continued to claim to be the legitimate government of the Polish state in competition with the Communist People's Republic. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

During the Second World War, between 1943 and 1945, a military camp and a Wehrmacht prison stood on the grounds of today's park. After the official end of the war, the Yugoslav People's Liberation Army continued to operate Teharje as a labour camp for prisoners of war until 1946. The detainees consisted mainly of soldiers from local collaborationist forces, many of whom were liquidated in mass executions without a court order. Furthermore, several thousand prisoners and war civilians from Teharje and Huda Jama camp were killed and buried there between 1945 and 1946 by communist partisan units. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The exhibition “Slovenians in the 20th Century” in the National Museum of Contemporary History in Ljubljana presents the most important events and processes intertwined with the way of living and working in the territory of Slovenia from the beginning of World War I to the present day. The fate of Slovenes under the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia is prominently featured. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

In 1945, tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians associated with the Axis powers fled Yugoslavia to Austria as the Soviet Union and Yugoslav Partisans under Communist leader Tito took control. The British Army turned them back and forced them to surrender to Partisan forces. Tens of thousands were executed by order of the communist regime; others were taken to forced labor camps, where more died from harsh conditions. Among those executed in Macelj were 21 Franciscan (Catholic) priests, the names of whom have been engraved on the memorial stone. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Goli Otok is a barren, uninhabited island that was the site of a political prison and labor camp between 1949 and 1989. The prison was run by the authorities of the People's Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Most camp inmates were subjected to heavy physical labour, psychological oppression, malnutrition and abuse; many committed suicide. The exact number of inmates and deaths has not been determined, since most of the files covering the camp period were destroyed in 1966. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The monument, dedicated to all the victims of communism, stands in front of the building of former Prison no.1, which was used by the Soviet NKVD (1939-1941, 1944-1991) as well as by the German Gestapo (1941-1944). In 1941, more than 20 000 people (mostly Ukrainians, but also numerous Poles and Jews) were murdered in the NKVD prisons in Galicia and Volhynia by order of Beria, head of the NKVD. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The burial site of Bykivnya has been known since 1971 and according to official Soviet version, contained graves from the German occupation period (1941-1943). It was not until the end of the Soviet Union that it became apparent that the people buried there had in fact been murdered by the Stalinist secret police. It is estimated that anywhere between 10 000 to over 100 000 Ukrainian victims were shot ny the NKVD in Kiev and transported to Bykivnya. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A museum portraying the crimes of the Soviet regime in Ukraine from 1917 to 1991. It was established by a Ukrainian branch of Memorial Society as an exhibition "Not to be forgotten: The Chronicle of Communist inquisition", focusing on the system of concentration camps in the USSR. Other parts of the exhibition portray the fates of Ukrainian prisoners on the Solovetsky Islands and the history of Kiev during the Soviet period. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The monument was inaugurated in the 60th anniversary of the famine catastrophie in Ukraine, the Holodomor. It was a man-made famine in Soviet Ukraine in 1932 and 1933 that killed 7–10 million Ukrainians. Since 2006, the Holodomor has been recognized by Ukraine and 15 other countries as a genocide of the Ukrainian people carried out by the Soviet government, due to the rejection of outside aid, confiscation of all household foodstuffs and restriction of population movement. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The memorial is dedicated to former political prisoners and other victims of the communist regime. The plaques on the memorial bear inscriptions and an incomplete list of names of the victims of political tyranny who lost their lives and were executed in prisons. Every year on 17 November, the Day of Struggle for Freedom and Democracy, memorial events and ceremonies are held here. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The memorial is located at the site of mass executions of citizens of the Perm, Tomsk and Sverdlovsk regions. Between 1937 and 1938, death sentences were handed down by the regional troika - an extrajudicial tripartite body constisting of a local NKVD official, a party representative and the public prosecutor's office. The victims were executed and anonymously buried at the site. 46 metal plates list the names of 18 475 people who were imprisoned in the camps of Sverdlovsk and Perm Oblasts or otherwise became victims of political persecution. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Perm-36 was a Soviet forced labor camp from 1946 to 1988. The camp was preserved as a museum in 1993 by the private Russian human rights organization Memorial and has been open to the public as a museum. It is the only remaining example of a Gulag labor camp, the others having been abandoned or demolished by the Soviet government before the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The museum saw a withdrawal of support and funding by regional government organisations, following Vladimir Putin's return to the presidency in 2012, causing it to close in 2014. The museum was forced to transfer to state ownership and the management was replaced. Since the reopening, the focus has been on the contribution of prisoners to the Soviet victory over fascism and the repression is interpreted as a necessary evil. It is emphasised that all inmates were "enemies of the Soviet Union" and "criminals" and therefore justly imprisoned. New installations give the impression of reasonable detention conditions. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Sandarmokh is a forest in Karelia where thousands of victims of Stalin's Great Terror were executed. Over 9,000 people of more than 58 nationalities were shot and buried there in 362 communal pits in 1937 and 1938. After the graves were discovered in 1997, the site has become a memorial to the crimes of Stalin and his regime. Since 1998, annual commemoration events have taken place there on the international Day of Remembrance on 5 August. In 2002, the Chapel of St George was consecrated in accordance with an Orthodox burial tradition which dictates that each cemetery much have a church. The construction of the chapel was initiated by the Russian Orthodox Church with the support of victims' associations and Memorial. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Belomor Canal was a major construction project initiated by Stalin and built between 1931 and 1933. The canal was constructed by forced labor of Gulag inmates. Beginning and ending with a labor force of 126 000, 25 000 people died according to official records, due to the rushed nature of the construction and the difficult working and living conditions. These figures do not include all those people who were retired from the construction work due to illness or accidents or who died as a result of secondary symptoms. Only a short time later, the economic benefit of the canal proved to be insignificant. Due to its shallowness, it was unsuitable for industrial shipping. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Lutheran Chuch of St Peter and St Paul was built in 1833-1838 and housed a lutheran congregation until its compulsory closure at the time of the "Great Terror" in 1937. It was then used as a warehouse and the pastors arrested and executed in 1938. In the 1950s it was converted into a swimming pool which was used until 1993, after which the building was handed over to the Evangelical Lutheran Church. The aim has been to restore the building to its original state, which has been compromised by the technical complexity and financial expenditure and is yet to be completed. The permanent exhibition casts light on the suppression of religion in the Soviet Union. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Opened in 1920 as the State Revolution Museum, the State Museum of the Political History is dedicated to the political, economic and cultural transformation processes of the 19th-21st centuries of Russia and highlights the most important stages of change in the country's history. The museum houses artifacts owned by key figures in the history of Russia such as the belongings of politicians, statesmen, scientists and military leaders, among them Sergei Witte, Nicholas II, Vladimir Lenin, Mikhail Gorbachev, and Yuri Gagarin. The museum has two other brances, one of which at 13 Bolotnaya Street houses a children's museum, which conveys the history of Russia and the Soviet Union in a child-friendly manner. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A cemetery of victims of Soviet repressions during the Great Purge. Between 1937 and 1954 the area was used by the Soviet secret police as a mass grave for allegedly over 24 000 people, according to official figures. The exact number of people buried in Levashovo is unknown, however, historians estimate the total number of people buried in the area until 1954 to be up to 45 000. In 1965, the KGB of Leningrad ordered the cemetery to be permanently closed, after which the area remained restricted and was disguised as a military site. Since the mass graves were discovered in 1989 by the "Poisk" group ("The Search"), more than 22 memorials to various nationalities and groups of people have been erected. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Park of Arts hosts the country's largest open-air exhibition of sculptures by Soviet and contemporary Russian artists with over 700 exhibitis. After the suppression of the August Coup in 1991, the removal of Soviet memorials began in Moscow. The City Duma made the decision to collect the dismantled historical-political statues and sculptures to the park. In addition to works of socialist realism, the Muzeon also features works by Soviet avant-garde sculptors who, due to restrictive Soviet state ideology, were unable to make their works accessible to the general public. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A museum dealing with the history of the Soviet forced labour camps, presenting the history, development and dissolution of the vast system of "correctional labour camps" in the Soviet Union. In addition to the permanent and temporary exhibitions, the museum also hosts a research centre, a volunteer centre and a library. The museum owns a document archive with letters and oral histories of former Gulag prisoners and an extensive collection of pieces of art created by camp inmates. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A museum and cultural center in Moscow devoted to protection of human rights in Russia and preserving the legacy of the prominent physicist and Nobel Prize winning human rights activist Andrei Sakharov. The Centre's Museum views the history of the Soviet Union from the perspective of political repression. In 2014 the Center was declared a “foreign agent” under a law, which has been criticized for violation of human rights and countering opposition groups. In 2015, the court fined the Sakharov Center 300,000 rubles for not voluntarily declaring itself a “foreign agent”. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Memorial is the oldest and best known human rights organisation in Russia. It focuses on recording and publicising Soviet Union's totalitarian past, the preservation of the memory of the victims of political repression and monitors human rights in Russia and other post-Soviet states. Since 1990, the premises of Memorial Moscow have housed a museum collection containing more than 4000 original exhibits of camp art and items of everyday prison life. Memorial also helps individuals find documents and graves of politically persecuted relatives. As of 2005, Memorial had a database of over 1 300 000 names of such people. Memorial has repeatedly faced state restrictions: in 2016 the organisation was obliged to register as a "foreign agent" due to a law passed in 2012, which concerns all institutions that try to "influence public opinion" and receive funds from abroad. The controversial law restricts freedom of expression and the activities of independent institutions. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Donskoy Cemetery is a 20th-century necropolis, which has been closed for new burials since the 1980s. After the Russian Revolution, many Soviet soldiers killed during the Battle of Moscow and people executed by NKVD were secretly buried at the cemetery. In 1930, Bolshevik authorities dug a large pit in the east part of the cemetery to act as a common grave for the cremated ashes of executed political prisoners from Stalin's Great Purge. Altogether there are three mass graves in the cemetery which were discovered in the late 1980s: remains of victims of political repression from 1930-42, from 1945-53 and citizens of Germany who fell victim to political repression in 1950-53. The total number of victims at Donskoy Cemetery is impossible to determine, but the number is estimated at 10 000 - 11 000. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A monument commemorating the anti-communist resistance in Brasov from 1948 to 1989. The monument is dedicated to all victims of communism and includes the list of victims and places of torture. The initative for the erection of the memorial came from the Association of Political Prisoners in Romania and was funded with the support of local city and district authorities. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

In 15 November 1987, a workers uprising took place in Brașov against Nicolae Ceaușescu's economic policies in communist Romania, which erupted on the day of the local election. It ranks alongside the revolution that started in Timișoara as one of the most important protests in communist Romania. The inscription on the pedestal reads: "This sacred monument was ereceted in honour of the Brașovians who, on 15 November 1987, overcame their fear and scorned death to sing the hymn "Wake up Romanians!" and to chant "Down with communism!"" Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Romanian Revolution started in the city of Timișoara in 1989 and soon spread throughout the country, resulting in the trial and execution of longtime Communist Party General Secretary Nicolae Ceaușescu and the end of 42 years of Communist rule in Romania. Extremely violent action was taken against the insurgents and over 100 people lost their lives in Timișoara. Finally, the armed forces took the side of the people and Timișoara became the first city in Romania to free itself from Ceaușescu's dictatorship. The museum features photos, posters, video and audio material, reproductions and original exhibits from 1989 with special attention paid to the events in Timișoara. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Jilava was a fort built in the 19th century as part of the capital's defense system and later converted into a prison. It was also a detention and execution site for political prisoners after the start of Communist rule in Romania. The prisoners were subjected to violent humiliation rituals, mistreatment by the guards, torture, hunger and terror. It is now a memorial to the victims of totalitarianism. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Monument "Wings" commemorating the Anti-Communist resistance between 1945 and 1989 stands in front of the House of the Free Press. A statue of Lenin stood on the same spot until 1990 until its removal following the Romanian Revolution of 1989. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

With the rise of the Solidarity movement in Poland in the late 1970s, the memory of the striking workers of 1956 was rekindled. On the 25th anniversary of the uprising, the monument was inaugurated to great public sympathy. In addition to two crosses, the monument also has a stylised bust of the Polish heraldic eagle, which bears the motto of the insurgents: "Oh God, for freedom, justice and bread". Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A museum in the former Lenin Shipyard, devoted to the history of Solidarity, the Polish trade union and civil resistance movement and other opposition movements of Communist Eastern Europe. The centre has a permanent exhibition with over 2,000 exhibits, a library as well as a research and academic centre. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The monument commemorates the 42 or more people killed during the strikes of 1970. The protests were sparked by a sudden increase of prices of food and other everyday items. The monument was created in the aftermath of the Gdańsk Agreement and is the first monument to the victims of communist oppression to be erected in a communist country. Workers went on strike again in 1980 in support of the 21 demands of issued by the Interfactory Strike Committee (MKS) which eventually led to the creation of the trade union, Solidarity. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The monument commemorates the victims of the declaration of martial law in 1981. It reminds the viewer of those who lost their lives in clashes with the state security forces, suffered reprisals, were driven to exile or forced underground to resist the repressive regime. The monument consists of 7 figures sinking into the ground on one side of the street and another 7 rising up from the “underground” on the other side. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The monument commemorates the victims of the Soviet invasion of Poland during World War II and subsequent repressions, in particular deportations to labour camps in Siberia and the victims of the Katyn massacre. The statue shows a pile of religious symbols (Catholic, Orthodox, Jewish and Muslim symbols) on a railway flatcar. Each railway sleeper displays the names of places from which Polish citizens were deported, to use as slave labour in the USSR, and the names of the camps, collective farms, exile villages and various outposts of the Gulag that were their destinations, including the mass murder sites used by the Soviet NKVD. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Katyn massacre was a series of mass executions of about 22 000 Polish military officers and intelligentsia carried out by the NKVD (the Soviet secret police) in April and May 1940. The Katyn Museum, located in the Polish Army Museum, features objects, documents and personal effects from the site of the massacre. The museum relocated to the Warsaw Citadel, a 19th century fortress complex, in 2015. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The museum's activity is focused on the testimonies of the 20th century history. The exhibition "The Faces of Totalitarianism" presents the totalitarian experience in the 20th century from several national perspectives. The museum also maintains the largest oral history archive in the country, with over 5500 biographical interviews providing a very personal experience of the history of 20th century Poland through the eyes of contemporary witnesses. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The museum shows various stages of political persecution in socialist-ruled Mongolia. The founder of the musem was Tserendulam Genden, daughter of the former President and Prime minister Peljidiin Genden, who was executed in Moscow in 1937 during the Great Terror. The exhibition focuses on the development of the Mongolian socialist state in the 1920s and the horrors of mass terror in the 1930s, including reprisals against the Buddhist community. The museum is located in Genden's former residence and is currently undergoing extensive renovation work. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Exhibition "Soviet Moldova: Between Myths and Gulag" housed in the basement of the Historical National Museum of Moldova follows the establishment of the communist regime in 1924, examines the Great Terror of 1937/38, the signing of the German-Russian Nonagression Pact in 1939 and the deportation waves of 1940s and 1950s. The devastating famine of 1946/47 is also covered in detail. The exhibition features photographs, personal effects of victims, eyewitness accounts by survivors of the Stalinist deportations and documents from the former KGB archives. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Hill of Crosses is a site of pilgrimage, which has come to signify the peaceful endurance of Lithuanian Catholicism despite the threats it has faced through centuries. The hill took on a special significance during the years 1944–1990, when Lithuania was occupied by the Soviet Union. Lithuanians used the site for peaceful resistance to demonstrate their allegiance to their original identity, religion and heritage. The Soviets worked hard to remove new crosses, and bulldozed the site at least three times. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Museum of Deportation and Resistance is one of five similar institutions set up by the victims' association in Lithuania's major cities. It documents the Lithuanian resistance struggle against Soviet and German rule between 1940 and 1990. The permanent exhibition focuses on the underground struggle of the "Forest Brothers", partisans, who resisted the Soviet occupation of the country after 1944. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A park dedicated to the display of relics of socialist art - sculptures, portrait busts, monuments and statues - which "adorned" countless streets and squares of the Lithuanian SSR until the collapse of the Soviet Union and Lithuania's independence, whereupon they were removed from public view. A barbed wire fence surrounding the entire park area and several replica watchtowers on the perimeter of the complex refer to the mass repressions under Stalin, to which some 35 000 fell victim during the first Soviet occupation between June 1940 and July 1941 alone. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

On the ground level of the TV tower is a memorial to the victims of "Vilnius Bloody Sunday", the violent suppression of freedom demonstrations by Soviet special forces in 1991. 14 unarmed civilians died in an attempt to prevent the capture of the tower by forming a human chain. 700 others were injured. In 2005, the 8 metre scuplture entitled "Sacrifice" was unveiled as a symbol of liberty and national independence. In memory of the victims, the streets around the tower bear the names of the victims of 13 January. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The museum documents the process of Latvian independence and sheds light on the role of the Popular Front movement in the regaining of national sovereignty after 1990. The exhibition features documents, photographs, newsreels etc that reflect the historic process known as the Singing Revolution. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The former HQ of the Soviet secret police, where people were imprisoned, interrogated, detained and executed. The mass deportations of 1941, during which ~15 000 Latvian citizens were deported to Soviet penal camps in Siberia, also started here. During the entire period of the Soviet occupation of the country (until 1991), the "Corner House" served the communist regime as a place for the imprisonment, torture and psychological humiliation of thousands of people. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A museum commemorating the conflicts between the Latvian national movement and the Soviet security forces in 1991. After 14 peope were killed in the storming of the television tower by Soviet forces in Vilnius, Lithuania in 1991, over 500 000 people gathered in Riga to express their solidarity with their Lithuanian neighbours. The opposition movement led by the Popular Front of Latvia called on the population to erect barricades to oppose the advancing Soviet troops. This culminated in the storming of the parliament building by Soviet special purpose units, during which 6 people lost their lives. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A memorial honouring soldiers killed during the Latvian War of Independence (1918–1920). The monument was considered for demolition several times following the Soviet annexation of Latvia in 1940 but it was never carried out. In 1987, about 5,000 people gathered at the monument to commemorate the victims of the Soviet deportations of 1941. This rally started the national independence movement, which culminated in 1991 with the re-establishment of Latvian sovereignty after the fall of the Soviet Union. The 42-metre monument still serves as the focal point of public gatherings and official ceremonies in Riga. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A memorial and cemetery Ata Beyit, meaning "Grave of our Fathers" in the Kyrgyz language, is the site of many notable burials. The memorial commemorates the victims of the repressions in the village by Soviet authorities and is located on the site of the mass grave where 137 victims of the 1937/38 terror were buried by the NKVD. Accused of "counterrevolutionary activity" and defamed as "enemies of the people", intelligentsia, writers, teachers and students were executed. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Used as the Cheorwon regional HQ of the Communist Party of Korea before the breakout of the Korean war in 1950. Later, mass graves with the remains of people executed by the communist security apparatus between 1945 and 1950 were discovered there. Plaques commemorate the history of the house, which was added to the list of South Korean national monuments in 2001. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A military complex located on the inner-Korean border under the administration of the International Ceasefire Commission. Panmunjom is part of the common security zone between North and South Korea and still serves as a negotiating ground for delegations from both sides. It was also a place where the delegations of the opposing parties of the Korean War met. There are many commemorative markers in Panmunjom, including a memorial stone for the Allies who died defending the border as well as a memorial commemorating the signing of the ceasefire agreement. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The "Bridge of Freedom" is the only link between North and South Korea. It became particularly important when the exchange of prisoners commenced at the end of the Korean War in 1953. A neutral zone was created around the bridge where over 12 500 Allied prisoners were collected on the North Korean side and sent to South Korea for release. Consequently, the bridge was given the name "Bridge of Freedom". In 1998, a new four lane bridge was built on the site instead of the old railway bridge. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Statue of Brothers is a symbol of the Korean War, depicting a scene where a family's older brother, an ROK officer, and his younger brother, a North Korean soldier, meet in a battlefield and express reconciliation. The lower tomb-shaped dome was built with pieces of granite collected from nationwide locations symbolizing the sacrifices made. The crack in the dome stands for the division of Korea and the hope for reunification. The grounds of the memorial feature other various commemorative sculpture complexes. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Memorial to the Victims of Famine was inaugurated on the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Political Repressions. In Kazakhstan, about 1,5 million people died during the great famine. In the Pavlodar region alone, the famine claimed around 300 000 lives. The memorial depicts the figure of a boy crying in a desparate gesture to his mother who has died of hunger and exhaustion. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The opening of the memorial in 2012 marked the 80th anniversary of the artificially caused famine, which claimed about 1,5 million victims and destroyed the country's centuries old nomadic culture. Surrounding the sculpture of a woman streching her arms towards the sky are several mourning figures, such as were traditionally placed at the burial sites of indigenous Kazakhs. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Located on the "Atameken" national memorial site, the monument commemorates the victims of political repression, in particular the detainees in the numerous GULAG labour camps. The architectural basis of the complex is a traditional Kazakh tomb construction, the "kurgan" - a 27 metre high mound that can be climbed via staircase. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The monument was unveiled on the 20th anniversary of the border breakthrough of 1989, when more than 600 GDR citizens managed to flee to the West across the Hungarian-Austrian border. The memorial depicts a group of people rising from the ruins of a classical temple, thus symbolising the liberation of the peoples of Eastern Europe from communist rule. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

An open-air museum presenting some monuments from the Soviet era that shaped Budapest's city-scape for decades. The exhibits include famous figures of communism such as Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Vladimir.I.Lenin, Georgi Dimitrov, Béla Kun etc. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The monument is located where a monumental sculpture of Stalin used to stand and brought down by protesters during the revolutionary events of 1956. The memorial was unveiled in 2006, on the 50th anniversary of the revolution. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Over 400 victims of the Hungarian uprising of 1956 are buried in the distant corner of the municipal cemetery, including Imre Nagy, the executed Hungarian prime minister. Access to the area was not allowed during the Communist regime. The words 'Only a Hungarian soul may pass through this gate' are inscribed on the ceremonial Transylvanian gate at the entrance to the plot. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

A memorial in memory of the East German protest march. In 1953 around one million people took part in largely peaceful protests in East Berlin and across the GDR against the political and economic situation in the GDR. It is estimated that between 50 and 125 people were shot and killed in East Berlin and the GDR on 17 June by Soviet and East German military. Subsequently, the protest was crushed. ​​​ Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Berlin Wall Memorial is the central memorial to the division of the city, extending along 1.4 kilometres of the former border strip. The memorial contains the last piece of Berlin Wall with the preserved grounds behind it and illustrates how the border fortifications developed until the end of the 1980s. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

Three months after the end of the WWII, in August 1945, the Soviet secret service, the NKVD, moved Special Camp No. 7 from the small village of Weesow near Bernau to the camp at Sachsenhausen. Previously used as a Nazi concentration camp from 1936-1945, the NKVD maintained the largest of the ten special camps in the Soviet occupation zone until its closure in 1950. Some 60,000 people were held in this camp, of whom 12,000 died due to the catastrophic prison conditions. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The Soviet Occupation exhibition is located on the fourth floor of the Georgian History Museum, representing seven decades of the Soviet rule in Georgia (1921-1991). It is also dedicated to the history of the anti-occupational, national-liberation movement of Georgia and to the victims of the Soviet political repression throughout this period. Visitors can encounter the state's personal files of "subversive" Georgian public figures, orders to shoot or exile, and other artefacts representing Soviet-era cultural and political repression in Georgia. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The partisan groups in the Baltic forests, the "Forest Brothers", fought against the Soviet occupation. Between 1944 and 1953 in Estonia, some 30 000 underground fighters participated in the armed resistance. The families of the "Forest Brothers" were often subjected to repressive treatment as relatives of "class enemies", which usually went hand in hand with arrest, torture, economic ruin and deportation. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky.

The building of the museum was used by the South-Estonia Centre of NKVD/KGB in the 1940s and 1950s, as well as by the SS during the German occupation between 1941 and 1944. Visitors can explore the cells (including solitary confinement cells) and the corridor, which are restored in their initial shape. The exhibition features photos and things brought from Siberian prison camps, as well as information about the history of secret resistance organisations. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

Originally used as a fortification, cannon battery and a military base, the building was converted to a prison in 1920. It served as a prison and a detention centre under the Soviet and Nazi regimes that ruled the country between 1940 and 1991. Throughout the Soviet period, the NKVD operated in Patarei. Tens of thousands of victims of the communist regime passed through Patarei prior to their execution or before being sent to Gulag camps in the Soviet Union. The International Museum for the Victims of Communism is planned in the eastern part of the complex. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

A memorial on top of the mass graves of victims of Soviet secret police, the NKVD murdered in the summer of 1941. Between 14 and 17 June 1941, local NKVD forces in Estonia imprisoned over 10 000 people, as part of the Central Committee's policy to purge the newly annexed territories of "anti-Soviet, criminal and socially dangerous elements". The area features several unmarked crosses, symbolically marking the graves of those who were shot. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

A memorial for the soldiers and civilians killed in action during the Estonian War of Independence (1918-1920). The war was fought against Soviet Russia and the aggression of Baltische Landeswehr (armed forces of Baltic nobility). Estonia's struggle for sovereignty in the aftermath of World War I resulted in a victory for the newly established state and was concluded in the Treaty of Tartu. The memorial incorporates the Cross of Liberty, Estonia's most distinguished award established in 1919. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

A museum to those who died during the Red Terror under the Derg government. The Derg, officially the Provisional Military Government of Socialist Ethiopia, was a Communist Marxist-Leninist military junta that ruled Ethiopia from 1974 to 1987. The exhibition describes the history leading up to the Red Terror, the actions taken toward citizens who opposed the Derg, how the prisoners were treated and how they secretly communicated among each other. The torture and execution methods are reconstructed using life-size models. The museum also has displays of torture instruments, skulls and bones, coffins, bloody clothes and photographs of victims. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

Originally a prison camp for German war prisoners, it served as a forced labour camp for uranium mining in 1949–1951 and was used as a prison for political prisoners of the communist regime until 1961. Excessive delivery rates and non-compliance with the most basic safety precautions repeatedly led to accidents resulting in serious injuries and fatalities. The work with radioactive material and the consumption of radioactively contaminated water took a heavy toll on the health of the prisoners, with severe long-term consequences. Proclaimed a National Cultural Memorial in 2001, the Vojna labour camp opened to the public in 2005 after extensive reconstruction. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

Pankrác was used by the Nazi occupation administration between 1939 and 1945. On the ground floor of the prison is the authentically preserved "axe room", consisting of a meeting room, an execution room and a coffin room. The Nazi occupiers carried out a total of 1075 death sentences here between 1943 and 1945. After the communists took over in 1948, tens of thousands of opponents of the regime were imprisoned here, many of whom were tortured, and over 1000 people executed. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

After the invasion of the Warsaw Pact intervention forces in 1968, Palach and Zajíc took part in the student strikes, but were disappointed by the indifference of their compatriots. As a sign of protest against the encroaching "normalisation", Jan Palach and Jan Zajíc self-immolated in 1969 on Wenceslas Square in Prague, on 19 January and 25 February respectively. Another memorial in honour of the two men was built on the square during the Velvet Revolution in 1989. Both the immediate aftermath of the tragic events and the following decades saw repeated spontaneous demonstrations commemorating the suppression of the Prague Spring. The Czechoslovak authorities tried in vain to stop the commemoration of both events. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

A 3-metre bronze-imitation replica, inspired by the original 10-metre tall foam and papier-mâché Goddess of Democracy, which was erected by the Chinese pro-democracy movement in Tiananmen Square at the end of May 1989. The original statue was destroyed by soldiers clearing the protesters from Tiananmen square on June 4, 1989. In the run-up to the 21st anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre in 2010, the replica was presented by a Hong Kong pro-democracy alliance. It was seized by the police at a street rally in Times Square on the grounds that the display violated safety regulations. Under the pressure of massive public criticism, the decision was reversed. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

The Belene Concentration Camp was founded as a camp for political opponents by a decree of 1949. Popularly known as the "Bulgarian Gulag", Belene quickly developed into the largest camp for political prisoners in the country. Designed for a capacity of up to 3000 prisoners, more than 9900 men and women were interned here with sentences ranging from 6 months to 7 years. After 1989, Belene has become a symbolic memorial to all victims of the Bulgarian penal and forced labour camps. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

Monument commemorating victims of the labour camp of Lovech in northern Bulgaria. Notorious in local parlance as a "death camp" and cynically referred to by the guards as the "Sunny Beach" after a coastal resort on the Black Sea, Lovech was the location with the cruellest conditions in the system of Bulgarian penal and labour camps. Driven by unattainable compulsory quotas, the inmates were enslaved in the quarry under inhumane conditions. Many did not survive their imprisonment. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

Memorial commemorating the victims of the "Minsk Death March" of 1941, who were murdered during the evacuation of the NKVD prisons. Among them were Polish, Lithuanian and Belarusian prisoners. They were rounded up from the prisons of the frontline areas and initially taken to a forest near Minsk, from where they were to march towards Chervyen. The total number of victims is estimated at 5000 to 7000. After the discovery of the mass grave, the first memorial cross was erected in 1991. Although public commemoration of the victims was initially supported by local authorities, it is now considered undesirable. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

The memorial is located on the outskirts of Minsk, where thousands of people were executed by the Soviet secret police in 1937-1941. Since the discovery of the burial ground in 1988, a number of organisations and parties in Belarus have been trying to transform the area into a national memorial. So far, this project has failed because of the resistance of the state, which has yet to officially recognise the memory of the victims of Stalinist terror. The name Kurapaty has become synonymous with the crimes of Stalinism in Belarusian society. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

Memorial to the victims of political repression in Armenia erected on the initiative of the Armenian Memorial Society "Gushamatyan". The sculpture, designed by Gerasim Tumanyan, depicts a figure of a man streching his arms towards the sky in a defensive posture. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

A political prison at the village of Spaç, whose inmates were enslaved and forced to work in the nearby copper and pyrite mines. Spaç was one of the cruellest prisons in Communist Albania. In addition to the pursuit of economic goals, forced labour was designed not only to purge the prisoners of "wrong thoughts" but also to re-educate them to become "new socialist men" - with unattainable labour standards and inhumane working conditions. Due to the ruthless detention conditions, revolts were organised by the prisoners in 1973 and 1985, both of which were suppressed and the leaders of the rebellion executed. There have been plans to turn the rapidly deteriorating site into a museum, but no progress has been made to date. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

Memorial commemorating the victims of the Communist regime of terror, located in a former department of the Albanian Ministry of the Interior and prison. The first anti-communist protests in Albania, the radical persecution of the clergy, the internment of political prisoners and numerous punitive measures are presented. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

A multimedia exhibition, located in a 1970s bunker several storeys underground. The bunker was built for the highest state leadership in the event of a nuclear attack. BUNK'ART 1 is dedicated to the history of the Albanian communist army and to the daily lives of Albanians during the regime. BUNK'ART 2, located in the shelter tunnels, reconstructs the history of the Albanian Ministry of Internal Affairs from 1912 to 1991 and reveals the secrets of the political police “Sigurimi”, used by the regime of Enver Hoxha. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

A memorial commemorating the overthrow of the communist dictatorship and its victims. The art installation consists of an original segment of the Berlin Wall, a bunker and pillars from the notorious Spaç labor camp. The memorial is designed by Ardian Isufi and Fatos Lubonja. The latter was a former political dissident who spent 19 years in labour camps and solitary confinement. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

The National Museum of History in Tirana is the largest in Albania, exhibiting collections from prehistoric times to the collapse of the communist regime. A sub-exhibition, completed in 1991, focuses exclusively on the 40 years of Communist dictatorship and was the first exhibition to address communist crimes in the national museum of a post-communist state. The Pavilion of the Communist Terror displays documents, photographs and objects, which belong to the period of communist persecution from 1944 to 1991, as well as focusing on the system of labour and detention camps. Source: Museums and Memorials. Commemorating the Victims of Communist Dictatorships. 2018. Edit. Anna Kaminsky. (Publisher)

A monument to the victims of the Katyń mass murder committed by the NKVD in 1940 was opened by the Polish community of Great Britain at Gunnersbury Cemetery on 18 September 1976. The Soviet Union did not want the events at Katyń to be memorialised and applied pressure to the British government to obstruct the erection of the monument.

This monument was opened in 1990. It is located in Southern Cemetery in the quarter of the cemetery of Britain’s Polish community. At the opening of the monument, the British government openly admitted that the Soviet regime committed the Katyń mass murder, not Nazi Germany.

The last military units of the Independent State of Croatia surrendered to Yugoslavian partisans near the Slovenian border in Bleiburg on 15 May 1945. This was followed by the repatriation of civilians and prisoners of war to Yugoslavia. En route through Tezno and Macelj, tens of thousands of people were executed or taken to forced labour camps. A gathering takes place in Bleiburg every year on 15 May in memory of those victims.

The names of 7,526 people who perished are inscribed on the memorial that was opened on 11 September 1999. The memorial is dedicated to all who fell victim to the terror of the Communist Party before 9 September 1944 and to those who perished as a consequence of the actions of the totalitarian regime in 1944–1989.

This museum was opened in 2017 and is housed in the building where both the Gestapo and the state security organs of the communist regime had previously resided. The permanent exhibition consists of nine parts, where the surveillance equipment and methods of the state security organs are introduced, providing an overview of the fate of those people who ended up in the sphere of interest of the state security organs.

The Museum of Victims of Political Repression was opened in 2002 in the vicinity of the Tashkent television tower. The museum provides an overview of the persecution and repression of Uzbeks before and during the era of the Soviet regime.

This memorial was completed on 17 June 2000 at the joint initiative of the presidents of Ukraine and Poland. It is located in the place where the NKVD killed 3,809 Polish officers and 500 civilian citizens in 1940. A rusty metal wall with a rusty orthodox cross erected in front of it is at the centre of the memorial.

The memorial was created in 2000 at the initiative of the National Katyń Memorial Foundation, which was founded by US Army veterans of Polish descent in 1989. A memorial ceremony and mass are held at the monument every year in March. The sculptor Andrzej Pitynski modelled the monument in Poland, from where it was transported to the USA.

This memorial situated 20 km from Smolensk between the villages of Gnezdovo and Katyń was opened on 28 July 2000. The memorial consists of two parts, the territory where residents of Smolensk who were political prisoners are buried, and a Polish military cemetery. The Nazis found the mass grave at Katyń in 1943. All of the executions of Polish prisoners of war carried out by the NKVD in 1940 are known by this general name.

At least a million people passed through the Karlag camp complex, which operated in 1931–1959. The museum is housed in the former headquarters of Karlag in Dolinka village. In addition to tracing the history of the camp, the museum tells of the consequences of the inhumane policies that the Soviet regime directed against the Kazakh people.

The special unit of Karlag established in 1938 was a prison- and labour camp where the wives of traitors of the homeland were sent. In 1940–1950, 10,000 internees died there. In addition to the history of the camp, this memorial museum, which was opened in 2007, also provides information on the events of December 1986, when the Soviet regime bloodily cracked down on student demonstrations.

This museum is housed in the former detention and interrogation centre of the Khmer Rouge, which operated in 1975–1979 in the city of Phnom Penh, the population of which had previously been evacuated in 1975. Over the course of four years, 15–20,000 people were imprisoned here, of whom 12 were alive by 1979. The museum consists of the authentic prison, its archive and a memorial.

Choeung Ek is a mass grave of victims of the Khmer Rouge, also known as the Killing Fields, from where the remains of nearly 9,000 people have been found. Over a million people were executed here in 1975–1979. According to agreement, the human bones that have been found until now are allowed to rest in peace. A glass Buddhist stupa stands in memory of the victims. It is filled with more than 5,000 skulls, many of which have been crushed.

The memorial was opened in 2009, preceded by legislation passed in 2006 that declared the famine of 1932–1933 known under the name of Holodomor as genocide against the Ukrainian people. Since the year of the opening of the memorial, it has become a tradition to gather at the memorial annually on the fourth Saturday of November and to light candles in memory of those who perished.

A concentration camp in Teharje in Eastern Slovenia was established after the Second World War and run by Yugoslavia’s secret police. The camp was built during the war in 1943 for German forces and was at the disposal of the Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth). An estimated 5,000 internees were executed there without any court verdict. A memorial park was opened in 2004 in the former camp in memory of the victims.

The museum was officially opened on 25 March 2013 on the 25th anniversary of Bratislava’s anti-communist demonstration. The museum is a project that operates on a voluntary basis and its aim is to remember those who helped to restore freedom.

The museum is housed in the former KGB building in the city centre of Vilnius, where the occupying regime both planned and carried out its crimes. The exposition tells of the loss of Lithuania’s independence, the repressions carried out by the Soviet and Nazi German regimes, and the fight for independence. Historical prison cells and the execution room can be seen in the museum’s cellar.

The mission of this museum opened in 1993 is to show the fate of Latvia in the time of its occupation by Nazi Germany (1941–1944) and the Soviet Union (1940–1941, 1944–1991), to remind the world of the crimes against humanity committed by two foreign powers, and to commemorate the victims of these occupations. The museum is housed in a building that was built during the Soviet occupation to mark the 100th anniversary of the birth of Lenin.

This museum was opened on 24 February 2002 in a building that the dictatorial regimes that ruled Hungary had used as a prison and a place of torture and executions. The exhibition covering four storeys tells of the historical context of the crimes of these regimes as well as of the innocent people who were incarcerated and killed in this building.

This museum is housed in the headquarters of the East German Ministry of State Security. The building was completed in 1961 and remained a symbol of fear until 15 January 1990, when demonstrators took it over in the course of demonstrations. Since that time, a memory institution has operated in the building. Various exhibitions have been held here on the work of the state security organs and its effect on the population of East Germany.

The victims of the regimes of Nazi Germany, the Soviet occupation and the German Democratic Republic, who suffered under inhuman conditions in Bautzen’s two prison buildings, are commemorated in this former Stasi prison. Visitors can familiarise themselves with the living conditions of the prisoners of those times and with the historical and political background of the era at the memorial’s permanent exhibition.

Political trials were held under the Nazi regime and during the Soviet occupation, as well as in the early years of the German Democratic Republic, in the former court and prison building situated at Munich Square. Executions were also carried out in this same building in 1907–1956. The aim of this memory institution is to study the abuse of legal practice.

This memorial was opened in Tallinn on 23 August 2018. It is dedicated to over 75,000 Estonian victims of communism and consists of two parts. The Journey is a memorial wall on which the names are inscribed of Estonia’s inhabitants who perished in the course of the communist terror, and who never returned home. Apple trees are planted in the Home Garden. Footpaths meander between these trees and a united swarm of bees is depicted on the wall.

US President George W. Bush opened this memorial on 12 June 2007, 20 years after President Reagan’s speech, in which he told Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall. The Goddess of Democracy, a copy of the statue erected by students at Tiananmen Square during protests in 1989, is at the centre of the memorial dedicated to more than 100 million victims of communism.

The Vabamu Museum of Occupations and Freedom was opened on 1 July 2003. The KGB prison cells at 1 Pagari Street were opened to visitors in 2017. The museum’s permanent exhibition Freedom without Borders was opened in 2018 and tells of Estonia’s occupations, resistance, the restoration of independence, and freedom.

This memorial monument for the victims of Stalinist repressions was opened on 30 October 2017. The wall shaped like a scythe, symbolising death, is cast in bronze and consists of human figures without faces pressed together side by side to denote the anonymity of the victims. The monument was erected on a former parking lot at a busy intersection in the city centre of Moscow to show that repressions were carried out everywhere.

A large stone brought from the former Solovki prison camp was placed in front of the former KGB headquarters in Lubyanka Square in Moscow on 30 October 1990. People gather at this stone for a memorial ceremony every year on 30 October, the day of remembrance for victims of political repression. Another stone brought from Solovki camp is located in St. Petersburg.

The national memorial museum dedicated to the victims of the occupying regimes commemorates all those who suffered under the German, Soviet and Polish occupying regimes. This is the first memory institution in Ukraine housed in a former prison. The detention conditions of the political prisoners of that time can be viewed on the building’s first storey.

This pillar in Hong Kong commemorates the victims of the bloodbath carried out at Tiananmen Square in 1989. According to various estimates, they numbered at least 10,000. The statue was painted orange in 2008 to express support for The Colour Orange campaign, which drew attention to violations of human rights in China during the Peking Olympic Games.

This memorial monument is dedicated to the victims of political repressions. The statue cast in bronze was opened on 30 October 2005. The mourning angel is almost three metres tall and holds in its hand the Book of Ecclesiastes. There are two granite slabs behind the angel. The names of 171 people from Stavropolski district who were killed for political reasons and were later rehabilitated are inscribed on one of the slabs.

The monument located at Revolution Square is dedicated to the Revolution of 1989 and its victims, who laid the foundation for the rebirth of independent statehood. The 25-metre tall marble column was erected in August of 2005. The names of people who fought for freedom and perished in the revolution are inscribed on the two curved walls in front of the column.

Tens of thousands of ‘enemies of the people’ were shot at the Butovo firing range on the outskirts of Moscow and buried in mass graves in 1938–1950. The exact number of victims is not known but the names of 20,761 people who fell victim to the Great Terror (1937–1938) have been identified. Since there were over 1,000 Russian orthodox clergymen among the victims, a memorial church was built there.

A temporary memorial stone dedicated to the victims of the mass deportations carried out in Moldova in 1940–1951 was opened in 1990 at the Chişinău main railway station. The permanent monument was opened in 2013 and it depicts a so-called Train of Pain.

This memorial to the victims of communism was opened on 22 May 2002. It depicts seven persons going down a stairway. The first of them is physically healthy but the other sculptures have successively more serious anatomic damage, symbolising the pain caused by the communist dictatorship, but also the courage and resilience of the prisoners.

In cooperation with the International Centre for Researching Communism, the Citizens’ Academy Foundation set itself the objective in 1993 to establish a museum that would deal with the communist past of Romania and other Central and Eastern European countries. The Memorial Museum was established in a former prison.

This memorial dedicated to the victims of political repression was opened on 12 June 1996. A station for distributing prisoners stood in the same place during Stalin’s lifetime. The journeys of imprisoned persons branched out from there to different prison camps in Kolyma.

This memorial opened in the village of Csömör at the city limits of Budapest on 21 October 2006 commemorates the victims of communism of the entire world and the freedom fighters of Hungary’s Revolution of 1956. There is a Hungarian national flag made of steel in front of the monument. This flag has a hole in it – in 1956, the freedom fighters cut the communist symbols out of the Hungarian flag.

In 1941 before the German invasion, the NKVD killed over 500 citizens of occupied Poland, including women and children, in Demjaniv Laz. After the war, the Soviet regime tried to conceal the existence of the mass grave that the Germans had discovered. It was only in 1989 that the local Memorial Society succeeded in identifying the location of the grave. The monument to the victims was opened in 1998.

This memorial was opened in June of 1991. It stands in memory of the Polish political prisoners and Polish officers who were shot by the NKVD in the Katyń woods in 1940. The bronze monument depicts a wounded Polish soldier that was modelled by the Polish-American sculptor Andrzej Pitynski.