The pointed obelisk alongside the highway to Pirita is part of the Maarjamäe Memorial complex, a cement-filled park similar in its imposing style to other large complexes created in the USSR in the 1960s and 70s. The 35-metre obelisk was designed by Mart Port and executed by sculptor Lembit Toll. The memorial is made up of many parts: the spire, in memory of Russians who died in 1918, the concrete and iron figures honouring Soviet soldiers killed trying to fend off the Nazis in 1941, the graves of the crews of the Avtroil and Spartak minesweepers, grassy slopes and pathways, and a bronze sculpture of a flock of birds entitled "Perishing Seagulls", a symbol of the two political powers of the time. Next to the memorial is also the Maarjamäe German military cemetery.
