BETWEEN HITLER AND STALIN

DAMIANIV LAZ

During perestroika, the organization Memorial was founded in order to investigate Stalinist crimes. In 1989 Memorial was instrumental in uncovering a mass grave at Damianiv Laz in Ivano-Frankivsk oblast. The Soviet authorities, after the end of WWII, used bulldozers to change the landscape at Damianiv Laz in an attempt to cover up the crimes committed there. It is estimated that some1500 victims were buried there. Documents found in the grave confirmed that those buried at Damianiv Laz were victims of the NKVD, shot during the Red Terror that gripped Western Ukraine during the first Soviet occupation, 1939-41. Damianiv Laz is but one of the countless mass graves that were left behind in Ukraine by the Soviet regime.