Statues not far from Stalin World are in danger

The Guardian reports, from Vilnius, Lithuania:

[On] the Green Bridge over the Neris river in Vilnius the approaches are dominated by monuments to heroic Soviet archetypes: soldiers, workers, farmers and students.

But for how much longer? Plans to remove the badly corroded monoliths for repairs are proving highly controversial in Lithuania, particularly among the Russian-speaking minority…

After Lithuania restored its independence, most of the Soviet sculptures were removed and demolished. Some of the sculptures that remained intact were later collected and moved to the Grutas sculpture park near Druskininkai, where a local businessman, Viliumas Malinauskas, made a tourist attraction out of the monuments. His idea was awarded an Ig Nobel peace prize in 2001.

Here are some of the many statues in the Grutas sculpture park — an institution that most people call “Stalin World“: