Tiraspol, 19 June. /Novosti Pridnestrovya/. A requiem rally was held in Bendery to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Moldova's aggression against the city. Several thousands of people — including city defenders, the country's leadership, members of the Remembrance Union, the Union of Women and other NGOs — gathered on Liberation Square.
The rally was opened by the war veteran Vyacheslav Kogut, who was chairman of Bendery's executive committee in 1992. «The events of that time were the day that divided society, divided into those who defended the PMR and those who arrogantly and savagely entered the city to 'restore' the so-called constitutional order. We saw the examples of that constitutional order — ransacked enterprises, huge material damage, but most importantly, the loss of our residents, the loss of husbands, sons, children," said the veteran.
President Krasnoselsky recalled that just a few days before the attack on Bendery the Moldovan parliament had voted for an exclusively peaceful resolution of the Moldo-Pridnestrovian conflict, in connection with which the city was unblocked, but on 19 June Moldova had launched an invasion of Bendery.
«The military, of course, understand that when the decision [on peaceful settlement] was being made, an order to invade the PMR had already been issued. It was a great deception," said the president.
Vadim Krasnoselsky underscored that Moldova's attack on the city had been motivated by Pridnestrovie's orientation towards Russia, which ran counter the foreign policy aspirations of Moldova. «The act of aggression against Pridnestrovie was, by and large, an act of aggression against Russia, against the choice of the Pridnestrovian people to live in one state with Russia," said the president.
The president noted the enormous role of the defenders of the city and country who had opposed the aggressor until the sides were divided by Russian peacekeepers.
«It is thanks to the fallen and those who remained alive that a peacekeeping mission began. But for defenders, there would have been no peacekeepers," stated the president.
Vadim Krasnoselsky recalled that Moldova had not yet given a legal assessment of Bendery's invasion, no one had been tried for the murder of city inhabitants, instead, according to the president, Moldova's law enforcement authorities brought criminal charges against Pridnestrovian officials and ordinary citizens.
«The Constitutional Court of Moldova has decided that the Russian deployment is aggression, occupation and that any measures, including military ones, can be applied to restore the very same 'constitutional' order. Twenty-five years has passed, but unfortunately, nothing has changed," maintained the president.
The first president of the PMR, Igor Smirnov, and the head of Bendery's state administration, Roman Ivanchenko, also addressed the rally.
Igor Smirnov stated that the root cause of the Bendery tragedy had been the breakup of the Soviet Union. It is the collapse of the state that had provoked the desire to force everyone to speak the same language, to study the history that would be written, simply put, to kill human dignity," said Smirnov, adding that the attack on Bendery was not just a conflict but a war «against the canons of life.»
The head of Bendery said that, regardless of how long it would take, the memory of the city's defenders would remain forever in the history of the republic and thanked Russia's peacekeeping contingent, which has been keeping peace on the banks of Dniester for 25 years. «In 1992, the people stood up to defend their city, their homes, families, their right to live according to conscience. That right cost Bendery 616 human lives. The price is too high to forgive and believe those who came to kill us," noted Ivanchenko.
At the end of the meeting, rally comperes read out a message from Bendery's inhabitants to their descendants adopted on the first anniversary of the Bendery tragedy.
«We were killed; we were forced to kneel and think as they do in Kishinev; we were considered second-class people," the message reads. The citizens of Bendery who came to the first mourning rally had noted that the city had become a Pridnestrovian Stalingrad as it had resisted the aggressor and survived.
After the rally the columns of Pridnestrovian defenders marched to the Memorial of Remembrance and Sorrow to lay flowers in memory of the fallen warriors who saved Bendery.
