Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, Russia has destroyed over 1,000 cultural heritage sites in Ukraine, including those under the protection of UNESCO, according to the Culture Ministry.
Moscow destroys cultural monuments not only with missile or drone strikes. Several historical monuments are under occupation, where Russian occupation authorties carry out so-called restorations, changing the authentic appearance of sites or destroying them completely, erasing all possible references to Ukrainian or Crimean Tatar culture.
As of Oct. 16, UNESCO confirmed the damage to 457 sites, including 143 religious sites, 231 buildings of historical or artistic interest, 32 museums, 33 monuments, 17 libraries, and one archive.
“It’s not only the killing of children, elderly people, or soldiers, not only the occupation of our land and expropriation of our assets, but the destruction of our cultural heritage and built environment and immovable heritage,” Jenia Gubkina, a Ukrainian architect and architectural historian from Kharkiv, told the Kyiv Independent.
Funner fact, this is a continuation of the ongoing genocide! There were attempts to stifle and assimilate Ukrainian culture (as well as numerous other cultures that happened to live next to russian state) for as long as russia existed as a state, including Soviet Union. We’ve got but a brief respite after 1991.