Bitter November

• Irina Khalip
• 14.11.2025, 14:49

Remembering Roman and us.

Thoughts of Roman Bondarenko in November become especially unbearable. A year has passed, two years have passed, and before you know it, five years have passed. If things had turned out differently, Roman would be 36 years old. And we - who knows? - maybe we'd be at home instead of running around the world hoping to return soon. Hope's not just a year old, either, by the way. Soon she will be an adult.

Roman Bondarenko's Memorial Day is November 12. But for some reason I remember very well November 14, 2020, exactly five years ago. The state of shock after the news of his murder had passed, and the courtyard at the Square of Changes was filled with people. There were thousands of flowers and candles. Hundreds of people. They were changing, though; the remembrance watch never ceased. Some stood at night, others during the day. In the evening the "Volny Chorus" came to this courtyard and sang "Magutny Bozha", and people kept coming, appearing from neighboring courtyards, from streets, from entrances. On such days, everyone wanted to be together, not alone.

Roman's murder was the point of no return, when hopes that it would be possible to stand firm and end the regime with peaceful marches collapsed completely. After his death, it became clear that the regime would easily crush people with tanks, burn them with napalm, and shoot them with artillery. And if many people still wrote off the murder of Alexander Taraikovsky in August as a mishap of the executor ("there was no such order, just a stupid cop shot, and in general the law enforcers do not support Lukashenko and will not shoot at their own people"), then together with Roman Bondarenko the hopes for the "velvet" revolution and victory by peaceful means were buried.

Oh, what a day it was then! Those who couldn't go to the Square of Changes lined up in chains of solidarity all over the city. Or rather, all over the country. There was no point on the map of Belarus where there was no chain of solidarity that day. Vitebsk doctors went out into the street with their mouths taped - this is how they think an ideal doctor should look from the point of view of officials. And Minsk "ambulance" doctors came to the action in the dawn gloom. Salihorsk miners went on strike. Opera singers sang "Requiem" in the Red Church in memory of Roman Bondarenko.

And that day there was also soccer, marathon and Morgenstern. The state needed the illusion of a peaceful quiet life, but it didn't get it either. Soccer players (that day Shakhtar from Petrikov played against Molodechno) after the starting whistle put their hands behind their backs and stood in silence. Many participants of the race in Minsk - it was the Belarusian marathon and ultramarathon championship - put Roman Bondarenko's photos on their backs and ran around the city with his portraits. And even visitors of the Russian rapper's concert before the beginning in Prime Hall chanted: "Lukashenko to the car!"

Should we mention that Nina Baginskaya with her flag went around the whole city that day? No, of course not, because it's clear: without Nina this day and this city would not have done without her. And there was an unscheduled women's march. There was also a demarche of Novopolotsk residents, who brought portraits of those killed during the protests to the highway, where the pro-government rally was held. And dozens of recorded video messages from different countries in support of the Belarusians. Journalist Kata Andreeva had a whole day left before the arrest. Vitold Ashurok was already sitting in the pre-trial detention center and waiting for the trial, but no one thought that he would become the next victim. People were still hoping that there wouldn't be years of sentences and deaths. And that the prisons were about to open and let everyone out.

It was an amazing day. I go through the memories of that day like a rosary. I string them together like beads. I wrap them in tissue paper like gifts for loved ones. Not only to remember Roman Bondarenko - none of us will ever forget him, no matter what happens next. Rather, it is to remember us ourselves - filled with hope, anger, rage and faith in justice. After all, we will never be like that again, just like that fall five years ago.

Irina Khalip, specially for Charter97.org.