2 yıl önce

Afghans donate blood for London protest art against Prince Harry's claims

“I reject Harry’s comments about killing people as though they are pieces on a chessboard,” Russian artist Andrei Molodkin said in reference to the British royal’s claim that he killed 25 people during his second tour in Afghanistan.

Russian artist Andrei Molodkin has projected a protest sculpture featuring blood donated by Afghans along with footage of Prince Harry onto London’s St Paul’s Cathedral.

Molodkin’s projection was in protest against Prince Harry’s controversial remarks about the number of people he killed in Afghanistan.

“I am an anti-war artist and a former Soviet soldier. I reject Harry’s comments about killing people as though they are pieces on a chessboard. I am drenching St Paul’s Cathedral in Royal Blood – the UK’s Royal Coat of Arms filled with the blood of Afghan people who have not forgotten the illegal war on their land and who are against Harry’s comments about his desensitised killings,” the artist wrote in an article in the Independent.

The Duke of Sussex received criticism after claiming to have killed 25 Taliban fighters while serving in Afghanistan, writing in his new memoir “Spare” that it was “not a number that fills me with satisfaction, but nor does it embarrass me.”

“While in the heat and fog of combat, I didn’t think of those twenty-five as people. You can’t kill people if you think of them as people. You can’t really harm people if you think of them as people. They were chess pieces removed from the board, Bads taken away before they could kill Goods,” Prince Harry wrote in his book.

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Molodkin's project "Royal Blood" has been filled with 1,250ml of blood from people who want to take a stand against British imperialism. (Courtesy of (Andrei Molodkin/Independent)

The artist said he collaborated with Afghan donors in the French coastal town of Calais and the UK for the sculpture.

The human blood was pumped into the sculpture of the royal coat of arms and then projected onto the cathedral.

The Duke of Sussex, who has stepped down from his royal duties and left the UK with his wife Meghan Markle, served as an Apache helicopter pilot during the war in Afghanistan, and his missions resulted in "the taking of human lives."

Prince Harry served in the British army for 10 years, rising to the rank of captain and undertaking two tours of Afghanistan.

In February 2008, Britain's Ministry of Defence confirmed that Prince Harry had been serving with the army in Helmand, Afghanistan, "for more than two months."

"Prince Harry is very proud to serve his country on operations alongside his fellow soldiers and to do the job he has been trained for," a statement from Clarence House, a royal residence in London, said at the time.