This is what Dmitri Dmitrienko said in an interview posted at the Governors web-portal earlier this week:
“Historically, there has practically never been any indigenous people in the territory of Murmansk Oblast, all people have in various ways come here from other places.”
The statement caused commotion among the Sami communities on the Kola Peninsula.
Today, the very same video is re-posted on the Governors web-portal, but now in an edited version. The sentence claiming that historically there are no indigenous peoples in the Murmansk Oblast is removed.
LASTEST: After BarentsObserver reported on the Governors editing of the video Thursday, the original video-blog was again online on the Governor’s site late Thursday afternoon.
The case has also made headlines in Norwegian media.
- When I saw this video on Facebook, I thought the head of the Murmansk Region, the Governor, should not forget about the county’s own indigenous people. I feel very disappointed by these incorrect statements, says Valentina Sovkina, head of the Murmansk regional Sami parliament to NRK Sami Radio in Norway.
Non-edited version posted on YouTube.
