MOSCOW, January 17 (RIA Novosti) – Authorities in St. Petersburg have reportedly ordered the removal of hoardings advertising German brands in an apparent attempt to placate possible anger among residents ahead of anniversary celebrations to mark the end of the siege of the city during World War II.
Memories of the grueling 872-day encirclement of the city by Nazi forces during the war remain vivid among survivors and the city’s heroic stand is an object of burning pride for its people.
NTV-Petersburg television reported Thursday that the order to remove ads for German companies from the city’s main streets and areas near cemeteries was issued by City Hall with the aim of “avoiding the outbreak of social conflict.”
City Hall denied issuing any such order and described the move as a provocation, the report said.
NTV said advertising agencies were told to replace German signs over the second half of January with posters marking the 70th anniversary of the complete lifting of the Siege of Leningrad – as St. Petersburg was then known – at their own cost.
In May 2010, the city’s then-governor Valentina Matviyenko ordered a pub chain to change its German name ahead of preparations for celebrations of the Allied victory in World War II.
Matviyenko said she was “outraged” by the pubs’ name – Hande Hoch, which means “hands up” in German – and said such signs had no place in a city that survived the siege. The pubs removed their signs at the time, but ultimately kept the name and remained open.
The Siege of Leningrad, which lasted from September 1941 to January 1944, was one of the longest and deadliest in history. About 750,000 civilians are estimated to have starved and frozen to death, many of whom are buried in mass graves in the city.
St. Petersburg marks two anniversaries every January: the partial breaking of the siege on January 18, 1943, and the full lifting of the siege on January 27, 1944.
