A mass grave of more than 1,000 Jews shot in the head by the Nazis during the Holocaust has been uncovered in Belarus.
Currently, 600 skeletons have been unearthed by Belarusian soldiers in a pit at a building site in Brest, a city along the Polish border. The historic city of Brest was the location of the Union of Brest and Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.
“We expect the number of victims to go over 1,000,” said Brest official Anna Kondak. “During three weeks, every day about 40 remains are being found. Now the overall number is around 600. As far as we know, there are two major graves here.”
“We will not allow the building of anything on bones of people,” said Gov. Alexander Rogachuk.
At least 28,000 Jews lived in the Brest ghetto between 1941 and 1942.
Some 17,000 people were known to have been shot in October 1942 near the Bronnaya Gora rail station, as thousands more were presumed to have been massacred.
Some 66 percent of Belarusian Jews perished in the Holocaust, according to American historian Lucy Dawidowicz in The War Against Jews.
