Separatist Moldovan Region Erects Monument To Russian General

Transdniester President Yevgeny Shevchuk, General Lebed's widow and brother, Russian Foreign Ministry officials, and commanders of Russian forces in the region attended the ceremony in the southern city of Bendery.

Lebed is revered in mostly Russian-speaking Transdniester for intervening on the side of the separatists in their 1992 war with Moldovan forces.

Moscow-backed Transdniester declared its independence from Moldova in 1990.

In March 1992, it engaged in an armed conflict with Moldovan security forces.

That ended in June of the same year thanks to the intervention of Lebed's 14th Army which was stationed in Transdniester.

Bendery was the main theater of operations for Lebed's armed forces.

Lebed later became governor of Siberia's Krasnoyarsk Krai and died in a helicopter crash in 2002.

Based on reporting by Interfax, ITAR-TASS, and RFE/RL's Moldovan Service