Authorities forbid to celebrate 500th anniversary of Battle of Orsha

Artist Mikola Kupava, the head of the organising committee to celebrate the anniversary of the battle, received an official reply from the Orsha district executive committee.

The local authorities did not permit to have a festival and a concert on Krapivna Field on September 6, Nasha Niva writes.

Mikola Kupava says the refusal is explained by mistakes in the application. “They said we did not inform about sources of financing of the event and did not invite an ambulance. They should have given us time to do everything right, but they just banned the event some days before the festival,” the artist says. The organising committee is looking for other opportunities to mark the anniversary of the battle, in which the forces of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania defeated the forces of Moscow.

On September 8, 1514, our ancestors won the Battle of Orsha, one of the most significant battles of those times. It was a victory over superior forces of Moscow obtained in a defensive war on our lands by our own army led by an Orthodox Hetman.