Cross of Sorrow, Koyrinoya, Republic of Karelia, Russia
The Cross of Sorrow is a memorial in Russia dedicated to the thousands of soldiers of both sides who perished in the Winter War of 1939–1940 when the Soviet Union attacked Finland. It is located in Pitkyarantsky District, Karelia, near the crossroads Pitkyaranta – Suojarvi / Petrozavodsk – Vyartsilya, 19 km off Pitkyaranta. It is the first monument to the Winter War in Russia.
It is a 5-metre (16 ft) cast-iron cross with Finnish and Russian mothers leaning to it from the opposite sides in sorrow for the dead. It is located on an artificial mound, on which groups of stones are placed to symbolize the perished soldiers.
It was unveiled on June 27, 2000 in the presence of government delegations of Russian and Finland. Its construction was planned according to the joint Russian-Finnish agreement about the cooperation in preserving the memory of those who perished in the war, adopted in 1992. The author of the monument is Karelian sculptor Leo Lankinen, who won the contest of the projects. Because of his death, the monument was finished by Karelian sculptor Eduard Akulov, with overall planning of the site carried out by architect Lia Karma, with the help of Finnish landscape experts Seppo Hiekala and Seppo Rosenberg from Kuopio, Finland, where a committee in support of the construction of the monument was established. The project was financed by many contributors from Karelia, Moscow and Kuopio
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