President Vladimir Putin ordered on Wednesday a statue to be erected in Moscow to remember victims of political repression, according to a document published on a government website.
The "Wall of Grief" memorial designed by Georgian-born sculptor Georgy Frangulyan will reportedly be put up by Prospekt Akademika Sakharova in the center of the Russian capital. The monument is scheduled to be unveiled in October next year.
Other works by Frangulyan include statues of singer Bulat Okudzhava and composer Aram Khachaturian in Moscow, as well as former President Boris Yeltsin's ornate tombstone.
Millions of people are believed to have died during political repression in the Soviet Union, which reached its apogee in the mass killings and imprisonments of the late 1930s under leader Josef Stalin.
Russian human rights group Memorial said earlier this year there were over 50 people in jail in Russia today for their political beliefs. The Kremlin denies Russia has political prisoners.
