Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-04-21-Speech-1-120"

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"en.20080421.15.1-120"2
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"On 8 April the public hearing held by the Slovenian Presidency and the European Commission dealt with an extremely important topic for the European Union. In the 20th century Europe lost millions of intellectuals and enterprising citizens because of totalitarian regimes. The wounds that were inflicted on our history have not healed to this day. The dictator of the Soviet Union, Joseph Stalin, wiped my homeland and the other Baltic countries from the map. For half a century we were not allowed to have our own national anthems or flags; and our capital city was Moscow. Stalinism and Nazism evolved together and divided Europe with an iron curtain. Hitler and Stalin’s brutality knew no national borders. As a Social Democrat I condemn dictatorships whatever their guise. I also stress that Stalinism and Nazism served as direct examples for other totalitarian ideologies. Metaxas, Franco, Mussolini, Salazar and a host of lesser dictators perpetrated crimes of their own, following Hitler and Stalin’s brutality. Their scope remained within the borders of their own countries and for that reason the countries concerned should have responsibility for establishing the true cost. An awareness and the study of each other’s history is essential so that the citizens of the countries of Europe can start to develop an awareness of the fact that they are also European citizens. We need an assessment, based on shared values, of the crimes committed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the KGB. Soon, seventy years will have passed since the conclusion of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. The atrocities of Stalin’s apparatus of coercion are still not viewed on a par with Hitler’s war machine. As a first step on behalf of common approach to history I would urge our governments to designate 23 August as a Europe-wide Day of Remembrance for the victims of Stalinism and Nazism."@en1

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