Vandalized Holocaust memorials, erected to commemmorate the Jews who were shot, burned to death, or killed in ghettoes and concentration camps, are being investigated in Odessa by the Regional Internal Affairs Directorate, according to “Vikna-Novosti” news agency. Memorials in Prokhorov Garden and Tolbukhin Square, as well as several graves at the Tairovskoye cemetery were vandalized. Unknown vandals painted swastikas, wolfsangels, and “Right Sector” and “Glory to Ukraine” signs over the sites.

The “Right Sector” itself called what happened a provocation done by people who aim to discredit the organization. This was a statement given by the leader of the “Right Sector” Odessa group Sergei Sternenko in a discussion with a journalist from the “Vikna-Odesa” informational agency. “The Right Sector had nothing to do with this incident. Why would we discredit ourselves?” The activist said.

Press Secretary of the Chabad Jewish community Boleslav Kapulkin also believes that what happened was “an obvious provocation,” aimed not so much at destabilizing the situation in Odessa but at “creating a negative picture.” The community is planning to go to the police about the incident.

The Regional Internal Affairs Directorate said that the offence has been preliminarily qualified according to Part 1 of Article 296 of the Ukrainian Criminal Code (hooliganism). The Directorate says that the guilty party will be found and held responsible.

The memorial to Holocaust victims near the Tolbukhin square has been cleaned up by the utility service providers.

At the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, the Lustdorf road near today’s square hosted former ammunition depots. In October 1941, over 25 thousand people were burned in nine barracks by the occupants. Most of these were Jews, both from Odessa and refugees from Bessarabia; moreover, prisoners of war were killed there as well, including approximately 3 thousand seamen of the Red Army.

After Odessa was freed, the mass burials at the Lustdorf road were opened by the Extraordinary State Commission on Investigating the Crimes of Fascist German Occupants and their Allies.