Russian Authorities Installed New Year Tree at Mariupol Drama Theater, Site of 2022 Mass Killing
Russian occupation authorities in Mariupol have placed a 14-meter New Year tree directly outside the city’s Drama Theater – the building that became one of the most harrowing symbols of Russia’s assault on civilians during the 2022 siege.
The Gaze reports this, referring to a statement made by the Mariupol City Council, operating in exile.
The tree was installed ahead of the theater’s planned reopening after three years of closed-off reconstruction. Local officials condemned the move as an attempt to overwrite the memory of the hundreds of men, women, and children who were killed when Russian forces bombed the building on March 16, 2022, despite a large “CHILDREN” sign painted outside to warn aircraft.
According to the council, Russian workers initially surrounded the destroyed theater with a tall fence, obscuring both the scale of devastation and the number of victims. The subsequent restoration effort, they argue, aims to transform a site of mass civilian death into a curated monument to “Russian culture” under occupation.
Occupation authorities are now completing interior work – installing seating, lighting, and a central chandelier, and preparing large outdoor screens expected to broadcast, among other programming, Vladimir Putin’s New Year address.
Mariupol officials stressed that residents who survived the siege view the installation not as a festive centerpiece, but as a “14-meter candle of remembrance” for those killed in the attack.
Independent investigations estimate that between 300 and 600 people died when Russian aircraft dropped two powerful bombs on the theater, which was being used as a shelter during intense shelling.
The images of the destroyed building circulated worldwide, becoming one of the defining visual testimonies of the atrocities committed during Russia’s assault on Mariupol.
As The Gaze reported earlier, Russian-installed authorities in occupied Mariupol are preparing to reopen the city’s Drama Theater after claiming to have completed its “restoration.” The opening is planned for December 2025.
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