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Memory Train project participants share impressions of Brest Fortress reenactment
22/06/2026 11:06
BREST, 22 June (BelTA) – Participants of the Memory Train project shared their impressions with a BelTA correspondent after attending the military-historical reenactment of the Brest Fortress defense, an event that traditionally unfolds at dawn on 22 June.
Arevik Akopian from Armenia had never been to Belarus and was struck by the scale of the reenactment. “Brest is very beautiful and has so many interesting places, but what I will remember most are the stories about the fortress and the people who shed their blood here. In Armenia, we read a great deal about the war in books, but reading is one thing and seeing such an action live is quite another,” the schoolgirl noted. She also voiced a keen interest in exploring other cities across Belarus and forging closer ties with her peers in the country.
Alyona Korobeinikova from St. Petersburg, by her own account, will remember the reenactment for the rest of her life. “There are so many sound effects that you feel completely immersed. It was on a vast scale. Emotions are overwhelming,” the young girl emphasized.
She added that her own family’s history is also tied to the war. One of her great-grandfathers died on 8 May 1945, just one day short of the Great Victory, while the other returned from the war without legs. For Alyona, therefore, what she witnessed at the Brest Fortress was not merely a historical reenactment; it was a reminder of her own relatives’ wartime experience.
Maxim Deckomben from France intends to visit as many memorial sites as possible, places that summon us to remember, and to deepen his understanding of history. “This is my first time in Belarus. I know little about the history of the Great Patriotic War, since my relatives did not take part in it, but I have already heard that the people here performed many heroic deeds. The reenactment told us a great deal about that, because here they painstakingly reconstructed the events of the past, bit by bit,” Maxim Deckomben noted.
The Memory Train project, initiated by the heads of the Council of the Republic and the Federation Council of the parliaments of Belarus and Russia, was first implemented in 2022. In 2025, it was joined by young people from 15 countries.
Arevik Akopian from Armenia had never been to Belarus and was struck by the scale of the reenactment. “Brest is very beautiful and has so many interesting places, but what I will remember most are the stories about the fortress and the people who shed their blood here. In Armenia, we read a great deal about the war in books, but reading is one thing and seeing such an action live is quite another,” the schoolgirl noted. She also voiced a keen interest in exploring other cities across Belarus and forging closer ties with her peers in the country.
Alyona Korobeinikova from St. Petersburg, by her own account, will remember the reenactment for the rest of her life. “There are so many sound effects that you feel completely immersed. It was on a vast scale. Emotions are overwhelming,” the young girl emphasized.
She added that her own family’s history is also tied to the war. One of her great-grandfathers died on 8 May 1945, just one day short of the Great Victory, while the other returned from the war without legs. For Alyona, therefore, what she witnessed at the Brest Fortress was not merely a historical reenactment; it was a reminder of her own relatives’ wartime experience.
Maxim Deckomben from France intends to visit as many memorial sites as possible, places that summon us to remember, and to deepen his understanding of history. “This is my first time in Belarus. I know little about the history of the Great Patriotic War, since my relatives did not take part in it, but I have already heard that the people here performed many heroic deeds. The reenactment told us a great deal about that, because here they painstakingly reconstructed the events of the past, bit by bit,” Maxim Deckomben noted.
The Memory Train project, initiated by the heads of the Council of the Republic and the Federation Council of the parliaments of Belarus and Russia, was first implemented in 2022. In 2025, it was joined by young people from 15 countries.