Photo: Darryl Levine
A memorial plaque honouring Boris Nemtsov was unveiled today, October 16, on the Human Rights Walkway in Pierre Elliott Trudeau Park in Côte Saint-Luc, Canada. The ceremony was organised by the City of Côte Saint-Luc in partnership with the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights.
Unable to attend in person, Zhanna Nemtsova sent a message that was read aloud at the ceremony. We publish her remarks in full below.
First of all, I would like to thank the City of Côte Saint-Luc, Irwin Cotler, and everyone who made today’s unveiling of the memorial plaque possible. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend the official ceremony today, but I hope to visit in the future.
When I think about my father today, and about the squares, streets, and parks being named in his honor around the world, I cannot help but think of the assassinated U.S. President John F. Kennedy, whose memory has also been commemorated across the globe.
What these two politicians have in common is not only that their memory lives on far beyond the borders of the countries where they lived and worked, but also their personalities. Both were young, energetic, and charismatic. Both represented the promise of a new political direction, and both were assassinated at a relatively young age.
Of course, the circumstances and political contexts of their assassinations, as well as the historical eras in which they lived, were very different. Yet both leave us with the same haunting question: what might their unfinished political futures have looked like?
After my father’s assassination, many people wondered whether, had he become president, Russia would have taken a completely different path, one without the war against Ukraine and without dictatorship at home. I am absolutely convinced that it would have.
And yet, I believe that the very fact that Russia has produced politicians like my father and Alexei Navalny gives us hope that change is possible.
Once again, thank you all very much.