Ural federal university: UrFU Military Education Center and Army Officers Honored Veterans of Afghanistan War

UrFU Military Education Center holds annually honors Afghanistan War veterans, among whom many were from Sverdlovsk Region and alumni of Ural Polytech and Ural State University

Veterans, cadets, military officers took part today in the annual memorial ceremony at Ural Federal University campus monument to deceased Soviet troops during the Afghanistan war of 1979-1989. Among troops stationed in Afghanistan many were of Ural origin.

UrFU Military Education Center holds annual ceremonies to honor the sacrifice of fallen men and women of Soviet Union.

The Afghanistan War of 1979-1989 was a conflict wherein insurgent groups (known collectively as the Mujahideen), as well as smaller Maoist groups, fought a nine-year guerrilla war against the Soviet Army and the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan government throughout the 1980s, mostly in the Afghan countryside. Soviet Union helped Afghanistan government to build the country-wide infrastructure, leaving a strong post-Soviet handprint on major cities and towns of Afghanistan. 14 453 men and women in uniform from the Soviet contigent died in Afghanistan from various reasons, and around 56 000 were wounded. Caused by economic crisis public outcry, the Soviet presense ended on February 15, 1989 after a lackluster 9-year drought and struggle containing the proxies and insurgency. The Afghanistan war is one of the dim pages of Soviet history yet the movement of ‘Afgan’ veterans of this war is very vocal in Russia.