A MAN, shouting “Rise! Rise!” came to Lenin’s Mausoleum and tried to splash it with olive oil. He wanted to bring the proletariat chief back to life, he explained to police.

By-passers at Moscow’s Red Square noticed a strange man, who ranted incoherently before taking out a bottle of olive oil. Police arrested him as he tried to force his way to the mausoleum.

The man, however, managed to spray the block stone pavement in front of Lenin’s tomb, which was temporarily closed off for maintenance.

Doctors, who attended to the unlucky reviver of the proletariat leader at the police station, ruled that he was “in need of psychiatric help.”

The police, however, decided to let him go and imposed a fine of 500 roubles (US$7.5) for disorderly conduct.

News about the incident reached Russia’s Communist Party whose representatives called the action outrageous, adding that vandalism should be punished regardless of the mental state of the perpetrator.

In recent years Lenin’s Mausoleum has, several times, become a target of vandals and political activists who tried to spray it with paint, holy water and throw toilet paper on it.

(SD-Agencies)