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Showing their solidarity with Ukraine: the people who came to the memorial service on Marienplatz in Weilheim.
At the microphone Brigitte Gronau (2nd from right), next to Alfred Honisch (r.).
Vigils for two years © gronau
The sounds of music school teacher Jakob Lakner's clarinet aptly accompanied the mood on Weilheim's Marienplatz: sadness, powerlessness, but also solidarity and willingness to help.
Initially there were around 30, and in the end almost 100 people who gathered at the Marian Column for a memorial service on Saturday afternoon, including many participants in the Monday vigils.
Weilheim
- The celebration took place on the exact day that Russia attacked Ukraine two years ago on February 24, 2022 at 4 a.m. with an attack on a Kiev high-rise.
“There is only one way to end this war.
The dictatorship in Russia must be defeated,” said Myroslava Schimke-Klubuk, who now lives in Weilheim.
The Ukrainian pediatrician gave her speech in her native language: The east of her country is occupied, “it is now life-threatening to speak Ukrainian openly there.”
It is not the first time that Russia has tried to “exterminate our language, our culture and us people.”
She speaks Ukrainian “as proof that it didn’t work.”
And also because there is freedom in Europe and “every person has the right to their own culture, and no one wants to destroy that.”
In their contributions, her husband Felix Schimke and vigil co-organizer Brigitte Gronau recalled the demonstrations on Kiev's Maidan, in which Ukrainians fought for freedom and democracy in their country and for rapprochement with the EU in 2014.
Schimke: “We have two years of war in mind, but for the Ukrainians there has already been a ten-year war.” Gronau: “Unfortunately, we had ignored the fact that shortly after the Maidan protests Russia annexed Crimea and that there was largely covert warfare in Donbass.
How fatal.”
Vigils for two years
The vigil “For Democracy and Human Dignity” was founded by some Weilheim residents at the beginning of 2022 during Corona times in order not to leave the public space in the city center to lateral thinkers and Monday walkers with their Corona actions.
At the fifth Monday meeting at the end of February, it was renamed “Weilheim for Peace, Democracy and Solidarity” because of the Russian war of aggression.
City Councilor Gronau: “We are now approaching the 100th vigil.” This gave rise to numerous relief efforts.
Pollinger Eckhard Zimmermann emphasized that solidarity remains unbroken.
The coordinator of the aid transports joined the “Solidarity Ukraine” initiative founded by Polling's mayor Martin Pape early on: According to Zimmermann, not only solidarity was needed, but also practical help.
“The initiative still exists today and, at the start of its third year, is stronger than ever before.” Thanks to a merger with three other organizations, a 40-ton truck with relief supplies is sent to Ukraine every two months.
At the beginning of the celebration, the participants silently remembered the people of Ukraine and the victims of the war.
The Protestant pastor Michael Hinderer: “There are no words for what is happening.”
Ralf Scharnitzky