Lenin monument damaged in St Petersburg blast
13:08, 1 April 2009
ST. PETERSBURG. April 1. KAZINFORM A statue of Vladimir Lenin near the Finlyandsky railway station in St. Petersburg was badly damaged in an explosion on Wednesday, a local police spokesman said.
"Unknown people detonated an unidentified explosive device by the monument at about 04:30 a.m. (00:30 GMT)," the spokesman said, adding that the blast had caused a large crater by the statue.
No one was hurt in the explosion.
The bronze monument to Lenin was erected at the site, where the Russian communist leader made a prominent speech after returning from exile in 1917 just prior to the Russian Revolution. The statue was later moved closer to the Neva River.
The 10-meter high bronze statue is one of the few remaining Soviet-era Lenin monuments to have survived the political changes in Russia. Residents of Russia's second-largest city protected it from artillery fire during WWII, Kazinform cites RIA Novosti.