The grave of the Ukrainian ultranationalist Stepan Bandera, who was murdered in Munich in 1959 by a Russian KGB agent, was defaced on Whit Monday. A police patrol that was on the way to the Waldfriedhof cemetery was able to arrest a suspect. He is a 38-year-old Munich resident who was born in Ukraine.
The man is evidently no supporter of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has been in power for five years. He had written the sentence “We need new elections” three times in Cyrillic letters on his gravestone. Zelensky’s term of office would have actually expired on Monday, but due to the ongoing Russian war of aggression, the new elections that were due were postponed under martial law.
Bandera’s historical role is highly controversial. Many Ukrainians revere him as a kind of national hero, but historians point to Bandera’s anti-Semitism and his occasional collaboration with Nazi Germany. The grave, which is usually decorated with flowers and flags, is repeatedly the target of attacks and is monitored by the police.