European politicians traded angry accusations about the decision to remove a controversial photo exhibition which portrayed the horrors of the war in Chechnya.
The removal of the exhibit from the European Parliament was “monstrous” Helga Trupel, a German member of the European Parliament told German news agency DPA. The ongoing fighting in Chechnya cannot be discussed without referring to its brutality, said Trupel, who is a member of the Greens. The photographs, some of which showed wounded Chechens, mass graves and other atrocities from Russia’s war in Chechnya were deemed controversial and were removed. Conservative former Lithuanian president, Vytautas Landsbergis and right-wing Polish deputy, Konrad Szymanski were the driving forces behind the photo exhibition, “Chechnya: the Final Solution. The two had compiled photos that document the suffering in the war-torn breakaway republic. Their goal was to raise questions about Russia’s human rights record ahead of a summit between the European Union and Russia scheduled for later in October. The exhibit opened briefly before being shut down by Quaestors, members of parliament in charge of overseeing internal regulations. The Quaestors had deemed the pictures too graphic and disturbing.