On May 9th, the Day of the Great Victory of our people over Nazi Germany and its satellites, the students from Uzbekistan Abubakir Rustamjonov, Ikromali Dekhkanov and Abduazim Karimov took part in a solemn ceremony of laying flowers at the mass grave of Soviet soldiers located in the civil cemetery of the agricultural town of Dashkovka, Mogilev district. The ceremony was organized on the initiative of Oleg Dyachenko, member of the Council of the Republic of the National Assembly of the Republic of Belarus, vice-rector for academic affairs of the Mogilev State A.kuleshov University.
The students came to honour the memory of their fellow countryman Shadi Shaimov, as well as the Red Army soldiers who were resting with him in the same mass grave. Soldier Shadi Shaimov died at the age of 19, in June 1944, during the liberation of Belarus from Nazi invaders. A simple Uzbek guy was a submachine-gunner; he fought in the 2nd Infantry Battalion of the 1266th Infantry Regiment of the 385th Infantry Division. In the battle for the expansion of the bridgehead near the village of Dashkovka, he showed heroism and accomplished a feat for which in 1945 he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union with the awarding of the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star posthumously.
At this holy place, the students laid a funeral wreath on behalf of all university students, natives of Uzbekistan. In Russian and Uzbek, they thanked the Belarusians for preserving the memory of Shadi Shaimov, and told that May 9 is celebrated on the state level in Uzbekistan as the Day of Remembrance and Honours. Bowing their heads low at the obelisk with a red war star, they honoured with a minute of silence the memory of all those who died for the freedom of our country.
Svetlana Kuzmenkova, the chairman of the Dashkovka village executive committee and deputy of the Mogilev district council, thanked them for participating in the ceremony and emphasized that the villagers reverently honour the memory of the great son of the Uzbek people, always bring fresh flowers to the mass grave, and schoolchildren look after a military grave. Thus, the relay of memory of the exploits of the heroes of the war is passed from generation to generation.
“On the fronts of World War II, Belarusians, Russians, Uzbeks, Jews, Ukrainians, Georgians, Armenians, Azerbaijanis and other peoples of the multinational Soviet Union fought side by side,” said Oleg Dyachenko. - They defended the Soviet Motherland from an external enemy! The feat of Shadi Shaimov is an example of not only military valour and courage, strength of mind, but also a symbol of internationalism, genuine friendship between the peoples of the Soviet Union. Despite national, religious, and class differences, people rallied in the holy struggle for freedom and independence.”
Oleg Dyachenko also emphasized: “Although the Soviet Union is no longer there, we still have a common story. We do not have the right to succumb to attempts to distort it, which, alas, are being made more often ... We will not go about the forces that consciously try to replace the truth with lies, rehabilitate traitors, and bring the deeds of real heroes into oblivion. The President of our state, the Council of the Republic, and local government bodies are doing everything possible to perpetuate the memory of the Great Patriotic War, a victory in which we came at a tremendous price. Millions of ordinary Soviet people such as the Uzbek Shadi Shaimov or the Karachay Osman Kasaev died on the fronts, in the rear, in the death camps. But our people survived, thanks to the will and courage, and today, I repeat, our duty is to preserve carefully the memory of this great feat. Victory will always be ours!”