Vandalism
On September 11, 2016, vandals desecrated a monument to the victims of the Holocaust in Budapest.
Since August 27, 2013, when a monument to the victims of the Holocaust in Budapest was desecrated, and up to October 2015, there were no acts of vandalism against monuments dedicated to Holocaust victims or Soviet soldiers-liberators of Hungary from Nazism. However, in October 2015, a memorial on a Russian military burial site in Fejer area was desecrated.
The desecrated grave site is in front of the Chora Municipality, it houses the remains of 178 soldiers who died during the Second World War. The monument was rebuilt in January 2016, and on February 1st it was destroyed again. Four obelisks were felled, one of which is not subject to restoration, and the central marble memorial plate was punched through in six places. Despite the fact that the incident occurred on February 1, Budapest did not notify Moscow until February 4. The mayor of the city was tasked with finding the vandals and police instituted criminal proceedings.
Vandalism of memorials related to the Holocaust happened two times in Hungary in 2017. In February, the memorial of the “Life March” in Budapest was damaged by white painting. One of the marble plaques was completely overpainted while others only partially damaged.
In August, the memorial commemorating the Jewish victims of forced labour during WWII was damaged in the town of Sopron at the Hungarian-Austrian border.
