The Russians Have Destroyed the Dormition Cathedral of the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra for the Second Time

“…People were running from the Lavra, saying that the Dormition Cathedral had exploded. The Germans were doing everything they could to put out the fire, but there was no water. Who blew it up and why was unknown. Probably the same demolition crews that had operated on Khreshchatyk. It was November 3, 1941. I saw the Lavra burning.”

This is how Anatoly Kuznetsov described the events of eighty years ago in his documentary novel Babyn Yar.

At the time, Soviet authorities rushed to blame the destruction of the Dormition Cathedral on the Germans. Yet Kuznetsov wrote the opposite:

“On the eve of the Soviet withdrawal from Kyiv, the deserted Lavra was surrounded by NKVD troops, according to local residents. No one was allowed inside. Trucks kept arriving and leaving.”

Soviet censors banned this passage from the heavily abridged first edition of Babyn Yar published in 1966. But the truth proved impossible to suppress. After emigrating to the United Kingdom, Kuznetsov published the complete version in 1970, revealing what had been omitted — including evidence pointing to the Soviet destruction of the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra.

Even the Nazis did not dare damage the Lavra. Russia has now desecrated one of the most important shrines of the Orthodox Christian world for the second time.

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