“THE nazis are coming,” Ukraine’s Communist Party (KPU) leader Petro Symonenko has warned after the demolition of the Soviet war memorial in Lviv and a petition for the destruction of its counterpart in Riga, the Latvian capital.

Authorities in Ukraine’s western city of Lviv claimed the monument needed to be demolished as it was in poor condition, but its destruction was only completed at the weekend after attempts on Wednesday and Thursday to bring it down were unsuccessful.

The Monument of Glory honoured WWII Soviet soldiers killed fighting the nazis. Thousands of Soviet-era monuments have been torn down since Ukraine’s 2014 Maidan coup and a subsequent law ordering the dismantling of all “communist symbols.” But war memorials were exempt from the rule, forcing the Lviv authorities to seek other excuses.