Monument to the Liberator Soldier, War memorial monument in Kharkiv, Ukraine.
The Monument to the Liberator Soldier is a war memorial in Kharkiv showing a Red Army soldier holding a carbine raised in his right hand. Two artillery pieces stand on either side of the figure, completing the composition.
The monument was unveiled in 1981 to honor Soviet forces who drove German troops out of Kharkiv in 1943. It was built during a period when the Soviet state was actively commissioning memorials to mark wartime events.
Locals call the statue "Pavlusha," a nickname borrowed from a similar Soviet soldier figure called Alyosha that stands in Bulgaria. The informal name shows how casually people relate to the monument, as if it were a familiar neighbor rather than a formal memorial.
The monument stands directly across from the August 23 metro station, so it is easy to reach by public transit from any part of the city. It is fully visible from the street and can be seen without entering any enclosed space.
In 2013, the National Bank of Ukraine put this monument on a commemorative coin marking the liberation of Kharkiv. That made it one of very few local memorials to appear on a national coin.
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