Mass grave of people killed during The Great Purge in 1937-1938 discovered in Batumi
By Levan Abramishvili
Monday, April 8
Batum-Lazeti Diocese was conducting construction works on Pridon Khalvashi str. 338, which was granted to the Georgian Patriarchate for temporary use, when they discovered a mass grave. Four sections contained up to 150 bodies. The bodies were carelessly buried without any respect. With the statement, the Diocese issued a list of people killed in Batumi during The Great Purge.
The Great Purge was a campaign of political repression in the Soviet Union. It involved a large-scale purge of the Communist Party and government officials, repression of wealthy landlords and the Red Army leadership. Modern historical studies estimate the total number of deaths due to Stalinist repression in 1937–38 to be between 681,692-1,200,000.
The Diocese announced that the discovered bodies would be buried on April 21 with honor.
Tariel Nakaidze, the chairmen of Georgian Muslim Union issued a statement saying that according to the list published by the Diocese, most of the people executed in Batumi were Muslim.
“Considering this, it is unacceptable for Muslims to be buried according to other religion’s traditions. Therefore I’m asking the appropriate authorities to involve Muslim clergymen in the burial process” – said Nakaidze.
The finding has a historical meaning since such mass grave hasn’t yet been discovered anywhere else in Georgia. According to various sources, the Patriarchate discovered the grave almost 2 years ago and only made it public now. It is also noteworthy that archeologists or historians weren’t involved in excavating bodies from the grave and it was all done by the Diocese and Patriarchate.
Irakli Khvadagiani, a researcher at the Soviet Past Research Laboratory, pointed out that it is a possibility that the mass grave isn’t from The Great Purge at all and graves like this require studying by professionals and with compliance to the appropriate standards.
“On the pictures that we see [posted by the Batum-Lazeti Diocese], only 2-3 people have marks on their skulls, when this was a carefully arranged practice by the repression machine, people were shot not with larger gauge firearms, but with smaller revolver-type guns that were pointed on the back of the head to ensure death” – said Khvadagiani.
Aside from the Georgian Muslim Union, several families of the repressed people in Batumi demand that DNM analysis be conducted to the discovered bodies to ensure proper burial and closure for the descendants of people that were killed in the purge.
As of today, no official statement has been issued from the state officials, so it remains unclear if the demands for the DNM analysis will be met or not.
