The 2nd annual Chornobyl Economic Development Forum was held this past week in Korosten. The conference was a great success, and we made some excellent new contacts with potential donors and partners.
I spent much of the conference helping out with various logistical and organizational issues, but also managed to sneak in a quick tour of some secret tunnels that were recently opened to the public. No one has been able to find any official references to the tunnels in unclassified documents within Ukraine, and there is speculation that the Kremlin in Moscow might have some information but they’re not telling. What is known is that the tunnels were constructed in the 1930’s, presumably for some kind of military or secret governmental use. It is known that Stalin had similar tunnels built in a few locations in Russia, including outside Moscow, and the Korosten tunnels seem to resemble those quite a bit. Why this base was built in Korosten is a complete mystery, though. And to have built them in Ukraine in the 1930’s, when millions of people were dying from the Great Famine, is unbelievable. The amount of human and financial resources spent on these tunnels in mind-boggling. They were dug out in solid granite, hundreds of meters deep. They have their own (still-working) power supply, independent water supply for both drinking and septic water, and air ventilation. There was a direct communications connection to Moscow. There were accommodations for 55 people, men and women. Fascinating stuff.
Saturday, Blane, Igor and I went to the Kyiv Fortress. The fortress is under renovation/reconstruction, and they seem to be doing an excellent job with the work. Much to our surprise, we found an absolutely phenomenal and priceless exhibition of ancient Ukrainian artifacts within the exhibition halls. I snuck a few photos, but I really wish I could have gotten more. Ukrainian museums still don’t seem to have gotten the idea of publishing viewbooks of their collections, and the dinky booklet about the fortress I picked up for 7 hrivna ($1.40) didn’t even have one picture of the breathtaking items on display. I would gladly have paid a chunk of change for an educational and photographic album about that exhibition.
I realized I have a decent number of photos of different Chornobyl monuments from various towns and villages. I’m going to start being more purposeful about this subject for my photos and I’ll be posting them on Flickr. Nearly every community I’ve visited in northern Ukraine has a Chornobyl monument, in addition to the requisite WWII monument.
Anka in Kyiv 