The International Day of Remembrance for the Victims of Fascism is observed annually on the second Sunday in September. This day serves as a reminder of the most horrific tragedy in human history. Today, as a brutal war against Russian fascism rages once again on Ukrainian soil, this date takes on a special, poignant, and painful significance for us.
September was not chosen by chance, as this month marks two key milestones of World War II: on September 1, 1939, the Nazis invaded Poland, and on September 2, 1945, the last aggressor signed its surrender.
Fascism and Nazism left behind millions of shattered lives and horrific crimes against humanity. This day serves as a reminder of the tragic chapters of history, of the crimes against humanity, and of the countless victims among the peoples of the world, including the Ukrainian people.
One of the tragic chapters of that war is the history of the Donetsk region, where the Nazi occupation regime unleashed large-scale terror. The shaft of Mine No. 4/4-bis “Kalinivka” in Donetsk became a symbol of this tragedy, turning into a mass grave for tens of thousands of civilians and prisoners of war. In Horlivka, one of the main sites of mass executions was the shaft of the “Vuzlivska” mine: into this shaft, over 100 meters deep, the Nazis threw—according to various estimates—more than 14,000 people—civilians from the city, Jews, members of the resistance, and prisoners of war. Mariupol also suffered a terrible fate: there, in an anti-tank trench near the village of Agrobaza, the occupiers shot thousands of local Jews, while in Kramatorsk, mass executions of civilians took place on the territory of Kreidana Hora. One of the alabaster (dolomite) mines on the outskirts of Bakhmut also became the site of a horrific crime: in January–February 1942, German occupiers walled up about 3,000 people alive in one of the tunnels (chamber No. 46), mostly local Jews. In total, during the years of Nazi occupation, the Donetsk region lost hundreds of thousands of lives.
The main slogan with which the civilized world emerged from the ruins in 1945 was “Never Again.” However, today we are forced to acknowledge with deep sorrow that not everyone has learned the lessons of history. Modern Russia has completely copied the methods and expansionist logic of the Nazi Third Reich, and the Donetsk region has once again found itself under attack by inhuman cruelty. What took place in Mariupol in 2022—the airstrike on the Drama Theater, the destruction of the maternity hospital, and the mass graves in Mariupol, Mangush, Lyman, and Svyatogorsk—was a direct repetition of Nazi crimes on that very same land. Filtration camps, torture in Olenivka, and daily devastating shelling prove that the ideology of “Rashism” is the direct heir to fascism.
Remembering those terrible events today means honoring the heroism of those who triumphed over tyranny back then, and of those who are holding the front lines now. Today we bow our heads before the millions of victims of the past and, at the same time, believe in the justice of the present, for every evil will surely be punished, and peace, based on respect for human life, will return once again to all of sovereign Ukrainian territory.