Don’t piss off Putin!

The Russian government has reportedly voiced their displeasure to Berlin authorities over them permitting the upcoming Lollapalooza Festival to be held at at Treptower Park, which housesΒ a large memorial site for Soviet soldiers who died during the second world war.

β€œWe express serious concern at the plans of Berlin authorities to allow a rock festival to take place in September at this memorial site,” the Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Thursday.Β β€œYou have to understand that this event, which will be attended by 50,000 people, will take place on the site of the burial of 7,500 Soviet soldiers who perished while freeing Europe from fascism. We believe holding events like this at memorial sites is unacceptable, and will involve – literally – dancing on graves.”

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(Courtesy :Β staticflickr.com)

The Russian foreign ministry’s letter is a follow up to a complaint letter signed by 10 ambassadors of former Soviet states, sent to the mayor of Berlin’s Treptow-KΓΆopenick borough six weeks ago. A spokesperson for the festival,Β Tommy Nick, told the Guardian there had never been plans to hold the festival on the actual memorial site, and that organisers were working on plans to build the site as far as possible from where the bodies were buried.

Lollapalooza Berlin was originally held in 2014 on the site of Berlin’s defunct Tempelhof airfield, but the venue had to be shifted asΒ parts of Tempelhof are currently being used as a temporary shelter for refugees. “It’s worth remembering that Bob Dylan played in front of a crowd of almost 100,000 here when that part of the city was still part of East Germany,” said Tommy. “As recently as 10 years ago, 200,000 people watched the World Cup next to the memorial. But maybe there is a different political climate these days.”
—–(Source : The Guardian)