In the 25 years since Ukraine officially separated itself from the Soviet Union, decommunization has been a slow, crawling fact of everyday life. Fairly quickly upon Ukraine’s independence, the most anti-Soviet towns, located mostly in Western Ukraine, tore down their ubiquitous statues of Lenin. But in many other parts of the country, the Lenins simply remained on their plinths. Tearing them down was too expensive and not seen as a priority. A few street names were changed here and there, but most towns continued to have a “Lenin Street.” In one Ukrainian city that I long ago called home, the …read more
Source: The American Interest
