22:56, 10 March 2025

Participants in rally in Nalchik share memories of deportation victims

An action in memory of those who fell victim to the deportation. Nalchik, March 8, 2025. Screenshot of a video by the Kabardino-Balkarian Radio and Television Center https://t.me/vestikbr/14675

A mourning rally was held in Nalchik, dated to the 81st anniversary of Stalin's deportation of the Balkars. Its participants remembered their relatives who were deported.

On March 8, it is customary in Kabardino-Balkaria to visit the graves of the relatives who survived the deportation; and elders tell the younger generation about what they experienced during the deportation, residents of the republic said in March 2024.

More than 200 people gathered for the rally at the "Memorial to Repression Victims of the Balkar People" in Nalchik. Representatives of the republic's leadership laid flowers at the monument, after which a rally was held.

The operation of Balkars’ deportation was conducted on March 8, 1944. War invalids, families of front-line soldiers, and communist party leaders were sent to Kazakhstan and Central Asia. Of the 37,713 deportees, 52% were children and 30% were women. During their 18-day journey, 562 people died. Only in 1957 were the Balkars allowed to return to their homeland.

Georgy Asanov, a resident of the village of Verkhnyaya Balkariya, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that he was deported with his family. He was four years old at the time.

"They brought us to Northern Kazakhstan ... We tried to survive. Despite what we had been through, the people endured. The elders said: ‘Hang in there, sooner or later justice will prevail’," he has stated.

Aishat Sultanova, a resident of Nalchik, knows about the deportation from her mother, who lost all her relatives in Central Asia. "My mother could not recollect the deportation without tears. After all, her entire family and all her relatives died in exile. She returned alone with a small child. Her two brothers died on the same day,” the woman said.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on March 8, 2025 at 01:59 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.

Source: СK correspondent