Vandals deface Belarus Holocaust memorial

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Published: 04/23/2008

Vandals painted swastikas on a Holocaust memorial in Belarus.

"Swastikas and other fascist symbols were supposedly painted on the first day of Passover" in Slutsk, Leonid Levin, the head of the Union of Belarusian Jewish Public Associations and Communities and the architect of the memorial, told JTA. "I visited the monument a week ago and that time it was clean."

Levin said the monument was erected last year.

Police visited the memorial Monday, he said, and photographed the vandalism.

"They arrived very fast," Levin said.

Slutsk, a town 70 miles south of Minsk, has a population of approximately 65,000, including several hundred Jews. Some 6,000 Jews perished in its ghetto during World War II.

"Vandalism is unusual for such town as Slutsk," Levin said. "More often such cases happen in larger cities."

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