Foreign diplomats to pay tribute to memory of Mussolini and other Nazi

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Today, on November 11, on the Defender of the Fatherland Day, the traditional laying flowers from foreign diplomatic missions to memorial plaques chevaliers of the Order of Lacplesis will be held at the Memorial Complex of the Fraternal Cemetery in Riga. The name of Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini is among other names lettered at these plaques, the member of the Latvian Anti-Fascist Committee (LAC), Eduard Goncharov said to a REGNUM correspondent.

“A month ago when the general reconstruction was held Heroes Room was recovered and people awarded by the Order of Lacplesis were arranged in alphabetical order. Though, the Order of Lacplesis is the highest military award which was awarded for the personal courage, Mussolini was awarded in 1925. Evidently, memorial plaques were made nowadays because both date of the birth and date of the death of Mussolini lettered there”, Goncharov explained.

He also stressed central grave sites of the memorial, where ambassadors of European states lay flowers, are the tombs of general-lieutenant of SS troops and one of the operators of mass shootings of civilians in 1941-1942 Voldemars Weiss. Weiss is the offender, can be read at the web-site of the Latvian president, where said the commission of Latvian chronologists investigated and unambiguously proved both Viktors Arays headed a shooting crew and Voldemars Weiss which was the Chief of Defense Staff  and instructed shootings took part at the organization of the Holocaust in Latvia except Nazi military officers", Goncharov said. Therefore, European diplomats in Latvia lay flowers to tombs of Nazi criminals feted them as defenders of Latvian state.

REGNUM earlier reported the anti-fascist committee in Riga sent letters of explanation to the diplomatic mission. Latvian Anti-Fascist Committee offers to consider the opening of rescheduled the memory arrangement laying flowers to November, 11 to another place for example to the Freedom Monument.

REGNUM reference:

The military Order of Lacplesis was the first and the highest award of the Lithuanian state in 1920-30^s the last century. Its establishment was initiated by Latvia's army chief Colonel Janis Balodis. It was awarded to warriors for the personal courage, which participate in the fight for independence of Latvian state. The day of establishment the order is symbolically November, 11, 1919, when the White Guard of Bermont-Avalov was defeated the issue related to the conferment of heroes. The regulation of the Order and its device For Latvia was accepted.

First orders were awarded to the highest Latvian command officers by the decision of the Cabinet of Ministers in 1920: General Peteris Radzin, Colonels Martin Penik, Krisjanis Burke, Julius Jansson, Janis Apinis, lieutenants Oscar Danker and Janis Purin. There are foreigners among the awarded by the Order of Lacplesis: Estonian General Johan Laydoner and Polish Marshal Jozef Pilsudski lent a real helping hand in exiling Bolsheviks from Latvia. The Order of Lacplesis of the second degree was awarded to 61 persons (including 18 Letts and 43 foreigners), the Order of third-degree was awarded to 2072 persons (including 1600 National army soldiers, 202 Latvian shooters, 271 foreigner). Soldiers of troops of Estonia, Poland, Finland, France, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Denmark, Italy, Belgium, USA and Japan are among the awarded. The Order was awarded to both persons and Verdun fortress for heroism of its defenders during the WW I.

The Latvian army has not fight since 1920 that is why this highest award was given to foreign politicians on the basis unmilitary prowess and political considerations since 1928. Among persons who took the highest Latvian award — the Order of Lacplesis of first-degree are participants of the WW I -French Marshal Ferdinand Foch and British Field Marshal Sir John French, also Belgium King Albert I, King Victor Emanuel of Italy, Italian Prime Minister Benito Mussolini awarded the Order in 1928, who became the founder of fascism, the idol and the teacher of Hitler later.