"Robert E Lee statue that sparked Charlottesville riot is melted down: ‘Like his face was crying’" by Nora Neus (The Guardian).
"The melting was the culmination of a years-long effort to remove the Confederate statue from downtown Charlottesville. The issue became a flashpoint in 2016, and sparked a deadly white nationalist riot a year later, in 2017, which resulted in the death of the counter-protester Heather Heyer and two police officers, whose helicopter crashed.
After a series of lawsuits, the statue was finally removed in 2021 to much fanfare. It had been sitting in a warehouse in an undisclosed location until even more lawsuits made their way through the justice system. Then, on 26 September this year, the final lawsuit ended. The statue could be melted down."
"The Identity Politics of Heritage.
Decommunization, Decolonization, and Derussification of Kyiv Monuments after Russia’s Full Scale Invasion of Ukraine" by Olena Betlii (2022).
"Russia’s war against Ukraine has shown not only how the Kremlin has weaponized history, but also how the victim can fight back by breaking historical ties with the aggressor. Since March 2022, Ukraine has been developing new identity politics of heritage. The article focuses on decisions made by the Kyiv City Council, the Ukrainian Ministry of Culture and Information Policy, and the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory regarding material objects associated with Russian or Soviet heritage. It also shows how Kyiv opinionmakers and experts have reacted to changes that will eventually result in the reshaping of the city’s memory landscape".