Representatives from Italy visited Glubokoye

Representatives of Italy visited the Glubokoye district – Head of the Mission of the Embassy of Italy in Belarus Tommaso Pietro Marchegiani and Defense Attaché Vittorio Parella. The guests were welcomed by the Deputy Chairman of the Glubokoye District Executive Committee, Tatyana Tarasevich. The purpose of their visit was to perpetuate the memory of Italian soldiers who found themselves in concentration camps in the district and died at the hands of the Nazis during World War II.

"The visit to Glubokoye in November has become a tradition for us, timed to coincide with the Day of National Unity and the Armed Forces of Italy," emphasized Tommaso Pietro Marchegiani.

As part of the visit, following the established tradition, representatives of the Italian side laid wreaths at the monument at the "Borok" memorial complex. The remains of 27,000 victims of the Berezwetsch concentration camp are buried here, including about 200 Italian soldiers.

Wreaths were also laid at a memorial site in the village of Orekhovno, where 10 Italian servicemen are buried in a mass grave.

The history of Italian prisoners of war in the Glubokoye region dates back to the end of 1943. Following Italy's unilateral withdrawal from the war, Germany, anticipating such a move and having conducted an operation to occupy the country and disarm the Italian army, presented the Italians with a stark choice: either continue fighting on Germany's side or be sent to prisoner-of-war camps. Approximately half of the Italian army chose to cease hostilities, sharing the fate of prisoners of war. They began to be sent to concentration camps in Poland and the Soviet Union. A significant number of Italian soldiers, according to various estimates, over a thousand, ended up precisely in the Glubokoye region.

The main body of Italian prisoners of war was held in the Berezvechye camp, while about 150 individuals were in the camp in the village of Orekhovno. Together with the prisoners from Berezvechye, they were employed in the construction of defensive structures on the approaches to Glubokoye and artillery depots in the Lavrinovsky forest.

On June 30, 1944, with the entry of the first Soviet troops into the territory of the Glubokoye district, German troops, not intending to hold the line, began the urgent evacuation of material assets. According to available information, they took the Italians from the Berezvechye camp with them, continuing to use them as free labor. However, according to the testimonies of local residents, all the inhabitants of the Orekhovno camp were shot. A few days after the liberation of the district, people discovered mass graves of Italian soldiers.

In conclusion of his visit, Tommaso Pietro Marchegiani noted that despite the geographical distance, the Belarusian pines reminded him of his native Italy, thereby emphasizing the invisible connection between peoples.