Putin Upholds Initiative to Build Military Glory Memorials in Russian Regions

Russian President Putin supports the initiative to launch a program to build memorials in Russian regions in commemoration of those fallen in World War II.

NOVO-OGARYOVO (Sputnik) — Russian President Vladimir Putin expressed on Saturday his support to the initiative of Andrey Nikitin, the interim governor of Russia's Novgorod Region, to set up war memorials in Russian regions, which saw brutal battles during World War II.

During a meeting with the president, Nikitin expressed his hope that the federal government could launch a nationwide program to build memorials in the regions, where the Soviet army sustained hardest losses, to pay homage to those fallen in World War II.

"This must be done. We will work it through with you," Putin said, commenting on Nikitin's initiative.

Nikitin told Putin that local businesspeople and other activists of Novgorod Region helped take care of already existing military cemeteries, but remains of slightly less than a million of those killed in the war were still not found and buried in the region alone.

Novgorod Region in Russia's northwest was one of the centers of most brutal fights, claiming millions of lives of soldiers and officers, during the Nazi aggression against the Soviet Union within World War II. The region's capital, the ancient city of Veliky Novgorod, was occupied by the Wehrmacht forces between 1941 and 1944.