Drobitsky Yar

Drobitsky Yar is a ravine 8km away from Kharkiv, Ukraine. In December 1941, Nazi troops invading the Soviet Union began killing local inhabitants over the following year. At the end of this period, some 30,000 people, mainly Jews were killed. Notably on December 15 1941, when the temperature was -15deg C, in Drobitsky Yar over 15,000 Jews were shot. Nazis killed not only Jews here but also Russians, Ukrainians and Armenians.

Memorial
In the beginning of the 1990s, an artistic contest was held for the best design of the memorial which is supposed to immortalize the thousands of citizens who perished from hands of the Nazis. Twenty-nine designs were submitted. The winner was the architect A Leibfreid. The construction of the complex was lasted several years and was then suspended due to the lack of funds.

At a meeting in late August 2001, the Kharkiv Oblast administration decided to resume the construction of the memorial. The oblast authorities supervised the construction process. The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine allotted 600,000 hryvnas for the construction. Contributions have also been made by city and oblast administrations, as well as by sponsors.

On December 13 2002, the President of Ukraine, Leonid Kuchma, opened the memorial.

The main part of the memorial is a monument symbolizing a synagogue with the Ten Commandments between its columns; most notably: "Do not kill". The memorial begins with a monument stylized under a Jewish menorah. A road leads from a black menorah to a white main building of the complex. Thousands of Kharkiv Jews took their last path along it in 1941-1942. These dates are found on the wall of the main arched building. Underground is a hall of memory; the wall will bear the names of the victims who are known to have died.

The territory includes two burials area. One trenches is 100 metres long and the other is 60m. The Kharkov archives contain data of fifteen thousand victims. However, the "Drobitsky Yar" foundation considers the number of the dead to be thirty thousand.

180 tons of a Zhytomyr granite was used in the construction of the memorial. This is the same material that was used for Lenin's Mausoleum. Due to the granite's particular qualities (it has reddish veins), the stones lying at menorah's foot seem to bleed.

Museum
On January 27 2002, a new exposition in the Kharkiv City Holocaust Museum was officially opened. The exposition was created in December 2001, when Kharkiv commemorated the 60th anniversary of the Drobitsky Yar tragedy. Excursions to the ravine had already been held before, but the official openning was on January 27. Six candles were lit in memory of the six million Jews, who died in the Holocaust.