UKRAINE, KHARKIV, Apr 24 — A photo of two teenagers making a Nazi salute near the memorial to Holocaust victims in Kharkiv’s Drobytskyi Yar appeared online, wrote United Jewish Community of Ukraine in their Telegram channel on April 23. 

City mayor Ihor Terekhov called the act, “a conscious mocking of memory,” and urged police to find “juvenile nazis” as soon as possible. Kharkiv police opened a pre-trial criminal investigation for using a Nazi symbol and then found and detained two Kharkiv residents from the photo. 

According to the police, two teenagers, 16 and 19, did the Nazi salute “for fun, to brag.” If found guilty by the court, they may face up to five years in prison with or without confiscation of property under part 1 of Article 436-1 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (production, distribution of communist, Nazi symbols and propaganda of communist and national-socialist (Nazi) totalitarian regimes.) 

Drobytskyi Yar is a ravine near Kharkiv where Wehrmacht soldiers killed from 16,000 to 19,000 Jews and Roma people during the German occupation of the region during World War II. 

The memorial complex was unveiled in 2002, following a decision to commemorate the Holocaust victims in Kharkiv Oblast, made after Ukraine gained independence in 1991.  

On March 26, 2022, Russian troops damaged the Menorah monument in the Yar from artillery. 

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