Cossack village planned to be founded in Minsk Zoo (Video)

The so-called “Cossacks” are going not only patrol the zoo in Minsk, but also to station themselves properly.

Recently the republican public association “Belarusian Cossacks” has started to patrol Minsk zoo. Cossacks’ patrol maintains order at the territory of the zoo on weekends.

“It is still an experiment, it’s too early to speak about a full-time Cossacks guard,” the head of educational department of Minsk zoo Alyaksandr Strohanau said on the phone to BelaPAN. “But the presence of Cossacks at the territory of the zoo disciplines visitors, prevents alcohol drinking and smoking”.

On July 25 a BelaPAN correspondent and a ‘campaign ataman’ of “Belarusian Cossacks” association colonel Yury Yafimau and ‘a Minsk city okrug ataman’ Henadz Zhumyonak had a stroll in the zoo.

“An initiative to patrol the territory of the zoo belonged to the administration of the zoo,” ataman Yafimau said in the interview. “It is done to bring order to the zoo, to make citizens follow the rules of behaviour in a public place, to act with respect to animals. Unfortunately, we cannot patrol the zoo on week days, as we are a public association. Now a two-month training period of guarding is coming to an end, and on August 9 Cossacks start real patrol service. In a solemn ceremony Cossacks are to receive certificates and will patrol the zoo on weekends as voluntary public order squads in line with the Law on maintenance of public order and”.

According to Yafimau, such assistance is necessary. “It is one of the peculiarities of our organisation’s activities. In the future, in August we want to organize a Cossack village (stanitsa) on the base of the zoo. It will be the third village in Belarus. Their main aim is to educate children, so that our cadets would master horseback riding, as a Cossack without a horse is not a Cossack,” the ataman said.

We remind that the Belarusian society was skeptic and wary about stepping-up activities by the so-called “Cossacks” in Belarus. In the Russian Empire time Cossacks regiments were usually sent to Belarus to dispose of insurgents. According to historians, Cossacks have left a trail of blood in our country. Many prominent personalities in our country were killed or harried to death by them.

“Cossacks in Belarus mean manoeuvres of politicians, imposing not only alien, but obviously unfriendly stereotypes on us. In the history of Belarus Cossacks are primarily associated with battery and forcing the nation to accept an alien faith. Those who are marching with nagaykas now, to my mind, are low comedians,” the deputy chairman of the Belarusian Popular Front party Vintsuk Vyachorka said.

He has also underlined that unlike Ukraine and southern regions of Russia, “Cossacks in Belarus have never been a social class, have never been represented as a state institution”.