Attempts to distort history of World War II are unacceptable: Nazarbayev

Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev criticized attempts of certain politicians and states to rewrite the history of the Great Patriotic War (World War II) and emphasized the necessity to preserve the truth about those years, Tengrinews reports.

“During the tragic years our people were a single whole when facing the Nazi threat. Those were our countries that carried the greatest burden, our fathers and grandfathers won. Had they failed to succeed, it would be hard to imagine in what direction the politics and economy would go and where our people would be now. Like all countries here, Kazakhstan made a significant contribution to this great victory. Nearly 20 percent of the population (of Kazakhstan at that time) – 1.5 million people went to the battlefields, and only half of them returned home. More than 500 Kazakhs became Heroes of the Soviet Union. Like other countries, Kazakhstan became a reliable rear,” Nazarbayev said at the informal meeting of CIS leaders.

According to Nazarbayev, historical facts sometimes have a tendency to be misconstrued. “Unfortunately, in these latter days, we see how certain politicians and countries attempt to rewrite the history of the Great Patriotic War (World War II). The historical facts are obviously distorted and played around. This is unacceptable for us. Together we must keep the truth about our victory unchanged, pass it to the next generations to prevent such catastrophe in the future. Today we see that not all have learnt a lesson and they continue to repeat mistakes of the past. We are going through a hard period, instability and new conflicts are emerging. The emphasis is now on power, not on peaceful diplomatic settlement of conflicts, which poses a great danger," Nazarbayev continued.

President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko supported Nazarbayev's vision. He reminded that it was "neither Russians, Belarusians, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, Uzbeks nor Tajiks" who won the war, but "the great Soviet people". 

Alexander Lukashenko also mentioned the necessity to resolve the conflict in Ukraine for the good of all the countries: "The former Soviet Union had conflicts, and today there is a conflict in brotherly Ukraine, and the sooner we solve this problem, the better it will be for our generation."

When speaking about Ukraine, he also said that it was unlikely that Ukraine would exit the CIS, because it would be very hard for it to enter it again in future. "Ukraine is important for us, and we need to approach this matter constructively," Lukashenko declared.

During the meeting, Nazarbayev also reminded that the challenge of the modern time was the global terrorism, which became international in terms of its forms and scale.

“Internal stability and peaceful development of all the nations are in danger. We can counter this evil only through joint efforts. Within the frameworks of the CIS, a comprehensive legal system to counter terrorism was established. This raises the need to improve the tools we have created. I believe that we can discuss these issues at the next meeting of the Council of heads of the CIS states," Nazarbayev concluded.

The next meeting was scheduled to October 9 in Kazakhstan’s capital Astana.

By Assel Satubaldina (Assemgul Kassenova contributed to the story)