Gallery: Estonian olympic champion's remains brought home from Sweden to Saaremaa
The remains of an Estonian Olympic wrestling champion from the interwar era have been reburied on Saaremaa, after being brought back from Sweden.
An urn containing the ashes Voldemar Väli (1903-1997), who was born in Kuressaare, were interred Saturday at the Kudjape Cemetery in Saaremaa's capital, alongside the ashes of Väli's widow, Fernande-Adele. She passed away the year following his death.
The two urns were brought from Stockholm to Saaremaa last month as the graves, in Råcksta Cemetery in the west of Stockholm, were due to be exhumed and removed.
The grave had been "already earmarked for removal in 2019 as there was no one to maintain it. Fernande-Adele and Voldemar had only one daughter, and her ashes were scattered at sea. So yes, unfortunately, there was no caretaker for the grave. And so—it was inevitable. Now he rests in the soil of his homeland," Veljo Kuivjõgi, who organized the Olympic champion's reburial, told "Aktuaalne kaamera."
Väli won two Olympic medals in Greco-Roman wrestling: A gold medal at the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics and a bronze medal at the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Estonia was an independent republic during the interwar period.
A religious ceremony marked the re-interment of the Välis' ashes, and the gravesite is marked by a new headstone.
--
Editor: Andrew Whyte, Marko Tooming
