The Museum of Soviet occupation ( ua, Музей радянської окупації, ''Muzei radianskoi okupatsii'') in

Kyiv Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the seventh-most populous city in Europe. Kyi ...

, Ukraine, is devoted to portraying the

crime In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definitions of", in Ca ...

s of the

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

regime in Ukraine from 1917 to 1991. It was established in November 2001 by the

Vasyl Stus Vasyl Semenovych Stus ( uk, Васи́ль Семе́нович Стус; 6 January 1938, Rakhnivka, Ukrainian SSR – 4 September 1985, Perm-36, Kuchino, Russian SFSR) was a Ukrainian poet, translator, literary critic, journalist, and an active ...

branch of Memorial Society as an exhibition "Not to be forgotten: The Chronicle of Communist inquisition." Between 2001 and 2007, the exposition grew into a full-fledged museum. On May 30, 2007, it received its current name.

History of the museum

In November 2001, the

branch of Memorial Society established on its premises an exhibition titled "Not to be forgotten: The Chronicle of Communist inquisition." Documents, photographs and posters made up the initial items of the exposition. These were gathered by the Memorial branch in Ukraine and by sister-organizations in Russia. Among the most interesting exposee items is a large map of Soviet concentration camps in Ukraine created during the time of

Beria Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria (; rus, Лавре́нтий Па́влович Бе́рия, Lavréntiy Pávlovich Bériya, p=ˈbʲerʲiə; ka, ლავრენტი ბერია, tr, ; – 23 December 1953) was a Georgian Bolshevik ...

. The exhibition contained such sections as "Kyiv Martyrology", "Ukrainian Solovky", an exhibition on repression of the Ukrainian language, a special library. It has a numerous archives of documents, books, videotapes etc. In May 2007 the exhibition was named a Museum of Soviet occupation. The Museum was visited by Honorary President of the

Paneuropean Union The International Paneuropean Union, also referred to as the Pan-European Movement and the Pan-Europa Movement, is the oldest European unification movement. It began with the publishing of Count Richard von Coudenhove-Kalergi's manifesto ''P ...

, European politician and a direct descendant of the Habsburg family

Otto von Habsburg Otto von Habsburg (german: Franz Joseph Otto Robert Maria Anton Karl Max Heinrich Sixtus Xaver Felix Renatus Ludwig Gaetan Pius Ignatius, hu, Ferenc József Ottó Róbert Mária Antal Károly Max Heinrich Sixtus Xaver Felix Renatus Lajos Gaetan ...

. The very fact of the opening of such an institution initially raised disputes in the Ukrainian society. Olha Ginsburg, the head of the

State Archive Committee of Ukraine State may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Literature * '' State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State * ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States * '' Our ...

at the time and a member the

Communist Party of Ukraine The Communist Party of Ukraine, Abbreviation: KPU, from Ukrainian and Russian "" is a banned political party in Ukraine. It was founded in 1993 as the successor to the Soviet-era Communist Party of Ukraine which was banned in 1991 (accord ...

, refused to share archive materials with the new Museum. Such refusal was described by the Director of

Vasyl Stus Memorial Society The name Basil (''royal, kingly'') comes from the male Greek name Vassilios (, female version ), which first appeared during the Hellenistic period. It is derived from " basileus" ( el, βασιλεύς, links=no), of greek origin, meaning "king" ...

Roman Krutsyk as "an ordinary communist practice to conceal their crimes". Eponymous museums are active in

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...

(

Museum of Soviet Occupation (Tbilisi) A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make thes ...

), Latvia and

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

.Museum of Occupations (Estonia)

References

Museum of Soviet Occupation, Kiev Museums established in 2001 Museums in Kyiv History museums in Ukraine Anti-communism in Ukraine Museums of communism {{communism-stub

History of the museum

See also

References