Every October 29 for the past 11 years the Memorial Society, the oldest active Russian human rights group, has held a ceremony in Moscow’s Lubyanka Square to honor victims of the Soviet dictator Josef Stalin. Historians estimate that about a million people were killed during Stalin’s Terror, and this is a much bigger deal for Russians than 9/11 is for Americans. In the 12-hour ceremony, hundreds of people read out many names of Stalin’s victims.
Except not this year. Agence France-Presse reports in the Guardian that Moscow city authorities refused permission for this year’s memorial despite previous promises that Lubyanka Square would be available. Lubyanka Square is best known for the enormous Lubyanka Building, the headquarters of the Russian secret police responsible for much of Stalin’s Terror, and officials want to move the ceremony to a less prominent location. The Memorial organizers have refused to move, so the ceremony is canceled.
Moscow’s banning of the memorial comes at about the same time that the Trump administration has proposed banning protests on the north sidewalk of the White House, along with additional restrictions on demonstrations in the National Mall, Lafayette Square, and the Pennsylvania Avenue sidewalks in front of Trump International Hotel.