Moscow cemeteries to get free WiFi

As part of a drive to bring free internet access to crowed public places, Moscow authorities have announced they are connecting up an unlikely new location: cemeteries.

Officials from city hall announced that free Wi-Fi would be available at three of the city's historic cemeteries starting next year.

It is hoped that the move will attract more visitors to the Vagankovo, Troyekurovo and Novodevichy cemeteries where many illustrious Russians, including Chekov, Khrushchev and Stalin are buried.

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Authorities say it will allow visitors to learn more about the people buried there. If successful, it will be extended to the rest of the capital's 133 cemeteries, the Associated Press reports.

Artyom Yekimov, director of a state-owned funeral company, said internet connection would also help visitors "unwind" at specially designated places in the cemeteries.

The telecommunications company YS System offered to install WiFi after carrying out a public survey this summer, the BBC reports.

"Respondents complained about the lack of internet at the cemetery," company head Yevgeny Abramov tells the Klerk.ru website.

"While we were thinking about how to implement this project with the greatest possible sensitivity and respect for the departed, an answer popped up by itself."