The article discusses the legal foundations of international communication about historical events, allowing either to prevent the wars of memory, or prevent their development and minimize the consequences. It is shown that in the late XX - early XXI centuries there is a process of updating history, caused by the fact that historical knowledge and historical memory came into interaction and partly even began to be equated. Historical events are considered as social injuries, legal methods are used to overcome and prevent them. The international and national legal norms regulating relations regarding historical memory and setting the framework for international communication are studied. The reasons for the adoption of legal norms and enforcement acts in the field of memory are identified: the creation of new national identities, the creation of supranational entities, the strengthening of traditional collective identities that are experiencing a crisis in the period of globalization. Various strategies for the behavior of states in the international arena are demonstrated: recognition of responsibility for crimes of the past (for example, Germany), emphasizing the status of the victim (for example, a number of countries of the former Soviet Union), and strengthening the position of the winner (for example, Russia). Options are considered when the past acts as a unifying principle for states and peoples (existence within the framework of one state, common enemy, etc.) or becomes the subject of serious political debate, sometimes reaching ‘memory wars’.