Lviv: “Territory of Terror” Memorial

A memorial complex to remember the victims of all totalitarian regimes is planned in Lviv, on the territory of the former ghetto and transit prison.

The initiators stress that their plan is international since it will represent the history of all the peoples who lived in Lviv and who were the victims of such crimes. They envisage that on the territory where tens of thousands of prisoners of the ghetto died, and an equal number were sent to Siberia, there should be five exhibit halls under the open sky.

The exhibits will be recreated according to a tunnel principle and divided into time periods: the Lenin period; Holodomor and the destruction of the elite (1919-39); the period of the first Soviet occupation of Western Ukraine (1839-1941); the Nazi occupation (1941-1944); the Stalin regime (1944-1955) and Khrushchev’s “Thaw”.

According to Taras Chopiy, the author of the project, items from the concentration and labour camps will be on display. The exhibits will be as multi-media as possible, with music, video, images and all forms of perception which touch people’s emotions.

Mr Chopiy says that this will be the first such memorial complex in Ukraine. He thinks that the work will most likely begin next year after all permits etc are agreed. He hopes that the museum can be functioning by 2012. A third of the cost will be obtained from international grants.

From a report here: http://dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,5537007,00.html