Finland to close Lenin Museum, which has been operating since 1946.

The Lenin Museum, which has been operating in the Finnish city of Tampere since 1946, will be closed. The exhibits will be dismantled.

This was reported by Censor.NET with reference to Yle.

Kalle Kallio, the museum's director, says that this decision is entirely dictated by the museum's needs. According to him, what is happening in the East now affects the way history is told.

"We can no longer do this under the name of Lenin, because it only leads to misunderstandings," he said.

See more: Russian occupiers erected monument to Lenin in Nova Kakhovka. PHOTO

According to Kallio, there were no direct attempts to influence the removal of Lenin's name, but there were difficulties with funding.

Next February, the new Nootti Museum of Eastern Relations will open on the site of the Lenin Museum. It will focus on transnational history: the relationship between Finns and Russians, the Soviet Union and the present day. The museum will cover the common history of the two countries, from the Russian Revolution and Finnish independence to the NATO era.

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Kallio believes that the history of relations with the East will be of interest to a modern audience and that the Nootti will become a respected museum.

"History did not end with the collapse of the Soviet Union, and we do not want to remain prisoners of the past. Authoritarian injustice is once again commonplace in Russia, but it has little to do with Lenin, who died over a century ago," he concluded.