Screenshot: 112 / Telegram

Alexander Bastrykin, the head of the Russian Investigative Committee, has ordered a criminal investigation following an incident in which an eight-year-old boy poured water on an Eternal Flame memorial in the village of Semibratovo, located in the Yaroslavl region, in central Russia.

The announcement was made via the Investigative Committee’s official Telegram channel on Saturday. Authorities have not yet specified under which article the case will be opened.

Found across Russia and former Soviet states, Eternal Flames are continuously burning war memorials commemorating the Soviet dead of the Second World War.

According to Russian law, children under 14 cannot be held criminally liable, but it is unclear whether the criminal case will affect the child’s family members. Local police said they had already held a “preventive conversation” with the child and his parents.

The incident occurred on 12 June, during Russia Day, a national holiday marking the 1990 declaration of sovereignty from the Soviet Union. According to Telegram channel 112, linked to Russian security services, the boy rode up to the war memorial on his bicycle, emptied water from a flower vase onto the flame, and then rode away. Shortly afterwards, local police were contacted by “outraged residents”.

This is not the first time that Russian authorities have targeted children for perceived disrespect towards war memorials. In January, three children, aged 10 and 11, were detained in the town of Kingisepp in the Leningrad region for putting out the Eternal Flame memorial with snow.