Monday, 23 June 2025
Every year on this June night, Brest greets a bloody dawn – a reminder of the first minutes of the Great Patriotic War. It was on this day in 1941 that the defenders of Brest Fortress were the first to bear the brunt of the enemy's attacks.
In the year of the 80th anniversary of the Great Victory, Belarusians from all over the country, as well as more than 30 official delegations, arrived in the hero city Brest to honor the memory of the defenders of the Fatherland and the victims of the war.
The event was attended by Dmitry Krutoy, Head of the Presidential Administration of the Republic of Belarus, and Sergei Glazyev, State Secretary of the Union State. Representatives of ministries and agencies, including Alexei Lyakhnovich, Minister of Transport and Communications of Belarus, and Roman Starovoit, his Russian counterpart, were also present.
On the Day of National Remembrance and Sorrow, Alexei Lyakhnovich, head of Belarusian transport agency, noted that this date holds special meaning in the sacred land of Brest, one of the first to wage an unequal battle against the Nazi invaders: "The Great Patriotic War left deep wounds in the hearts of millions of people and crippled the destinies of hundreds of thousands of Belarusian families. And no matter how many decades separate us from the events of those terrible years, we must remember that freedom and peace are priceless. Our sacred duty is to cherish them, passing on to future generations the memory of the great feat of the peoples who resisted fascism."
At the end of the requiem meeting at Brest Fortress, participants laid wreaths and flowers at the Eternal Flame and the necropolis slabs, honoring the memory of the heroic liberators.
