GORI, Georgia—Under cover of darkness here three years ago, municipal workers tore down a giant statue of this ramshackle town's most famous son: Joseph Stalin.

The 20-foot-high bronze sculpture of the former Soviet dictator, which stood on a 30-foot pedestal in Gori's central square for six decades, was dumped face down in an abandoned airfield 13 miles away. Georgia's government said the statue would be "consigned to the dustbin of history" and permanently removed from public display.

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