Russia destroyed over 100 libraries in Ukraine: officials

Since invading Ukraine, Russian forces have demolished 21 libraries and partly destroyed a further 101, according to the government in Kyiv.

Since invading Ukraine, Russian forces have demolished 21 libraries and partly destroyed a further 101, the government in Kyiv said on Friday.

Image by StockSnap from Pixabay

The figures were announced by Ukrainian Deputy Culture and Information Policy Minister Rostislav Karandeev on Friday, Polish state news agency PAP reported.

Karandeev said at a news briefing in the Ukrainian capital: “It’s typical Russian policy - destroying the native language, imposing their own rules for life.”

He added: “101 libraries have lost a significant part of their collections, while a further 21 have lost everything, down to the last document,” the PAP news agency reported, citing the Suspilne website. 

Before-after. In the occupied cities, the Russians take Ukrainian books out of libraries to an unknown destination, most likely just to burn them. Russia is carrying out systematic work to destroy Ukrainian identity at all levels. pic.twitter.com/B1K37JmdZH

— Ukrainian Struggle Centre 🇺🇦 (@UA_struggle) June 19, 2022

Karandeev also said that Russian occupation authorities were “stripping libraries and schools of all books in the Ukrainian language.”

He told reporters that “the biggest damage has been done to libraries in the eastern Donetsk region, the northern Kyiv region and the southern Mykolaiv region, as well as in the Kharkiv region in the northeast of the country.”

This is a public library in the town called New York in the Donetsk region, Ukraine. In 2021, a team of Ukrainian writers and activists, gathered and brought the best Ukrainian books to this library and organized New York Literature Festival in the town.
In 2022, Russia did this pic.twitter.com/ZkiChzKvNv

— Victoria Amelina 🇺🇦 (@vamelina) May 21, 2022

Friday was day 170 of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

(pm/gs)

Source: PAP, wnp.pl