Mikhail Kalashnikov

MOSCOW: Workers in Moscow have erased the illustration of a gun from a freshly-inaugurated monument of Mikhail Kalashnikov, inventor of the legendary AK-47 assault rifle, after it was found that the drawing was of a Nazi weapon. "We have checked the information about a mistake. It is confirmed. The sculptor, Salavat Shtsherbakoff, has acknowledged his mistake," the state-supported Russian Military History Society, which backed the monument, told TASS news agency Friday. The erroneous drawing was of an StG44 -- for…

MOSCOW: Russian officials and Orthodox priests on Tuesday unveiled a statue in Moscow of inventor Mikhail Kalashnikov, whose iconic AK-47 assault rifle has claimed countless lives worldwide. A priest sprinkled holy water on the seven-metre tall statue of Kalashnikov gripping his deadly creation, which will now loom over motorists from a traffic island in one of the sprawling capital's central thoroughfares. Culture minister Vladimir Medinsky praised the inventor and called the rifle -- which has been reproduced an…