Local officials of the ruling Russia's party sparked controversy by presenting the gift of a meat grinder to the mother of a soldier killed in Ukraine, an appliance widely used to explain Russia's brutal tactics on the frontline.
The United Russian Party in the Northern Marmansk region posted a photo on social media, showing officials smiling when they visited the bereaved mother with flower gifts and boxed meat powder gifts for International Women's Day, which is widely celebrated in Russia.
The post included a message of gratitude to “Dear Mother” in “Strength of the Spirit and the Strongest of Love You put in to Raise Your Sons.” He said the gift was the party's women's wing initiative.
Some online commentators have called gestures “shameful” and “inappropriate.”
Russia is often accused of throwing frontline soldiers into “meat crushing” with slight consideration of their lives.
Meat grinder in Russian, Myasorubkahas the same double meaning as English.
It refers to a tactic in which small groups of soldiers are sent one after another into attack, endangering major losses, with the aim of ultimately fatigue and overwhelming the Ukrainian army.
A local branch of the party in the town of Polynier Zoli defended itself against online backlash, saying that critics were making “a calm and provocative interpretation” of the gift.
Mayor Maxim Chengeev, who participated in the gift handover, said that while the meat grinder was not originally intended to be included, “one woman asked for it, but of course she couldn't say no.”
The local party later posted a video confirming that one of the soldier's mothers awkwardly awkwardly thanked the gift and asked for a meat grinder because she needed it.
Russia has not given numbers on losses in Ukraine, and the real sacrifice is unknown, but independent media has made it tens of thousands.
Russian services from the Russian website Mediazona and the BBC identified the names of the 91,000 Russian soldiers who were killed last month, adding that the actual tolls are likely “very high.”
At the end of 2024, then-U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin spoke of the murder or wounded of 700,000 Russian soldiers.
Ukraine also suffered a major loss, and its full scope is unknown.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said more than 46,000 Ukrainian soldiers were killed and around 380,000 injured in February. Media reports based on Western sources estimate the number of deaths in the Ukrainian military in the range of 50,000 to 100,000.
