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PACE strongly condemns crimes of totalitarian communist regimes
Strasbourg, 25.01.2006 – The Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) today strongly condemned the massive human rights violations committed by totalitarian communist regimes and expressed sympathy, understanding and recognition for the victims of these crimes.
The Assembly – which brings together parliamentarians from 46 European countries – said in a resolution that these violations included individual and collective assassinations and executions, death in concentration camps, starvation, deportations, torture, slave labour and other forms of mass physical terror.
The peoples of the former USSR by far outnumbered other peoples in terms of the number of victims, the parliamentarians said.
They also called on all communist or post-communist parties in Council of Europe member states which had not so far done so “to reassess the history of communism and their own past […] and condemn them without any ambiguity”.
“The Assembly believes that this clear position of the international community will pave the way to further reconciliation,” the parliamentarians added.
The Council of Europe was “well placed” for this debate, the Assembly pointed out, since all former European communist countries, with the exception of Belarus, are now its members and the protection of human rights and the rule of law are the basic values for which it stands.
A draft recommendation calling on Europe’s governments to adopt a similar declaration of the international condemnation of crimes of totalitarian communist regimes did not receive the necessary two-thirds majority of the votes cast.
For more information, please visit http://assembly.coe.int or http://www.coe.int/PAsession
Strasbourg, 25.01.2006 – The Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) today strongly condemned the massive human rights violations committed by totalitarian communist regimes and expressed sympathy, understanding and recognition for the victims of these crimes.
The Assembly – which brings together parliamentarians from 46 European countries – said in a resolution that these violations included individual and collective assassinations and executions, death in concentration camps, starvation, deportations, torture, slave labour and other forms of mass physical terror.
The peoples of the former USSR by far outnumbered other peoples in terms of the number of victims, the parliamentarians said.
They also called on all communist or post-communist parties in Council of Europe member states which had not so far done so “to reassess the history of communism and their own past […] and condemn them without any ambiguity”.
“The Assembly believes that this clear position of the international community will pave the way to further reconciliation,” the parliamentarians added.
The Council of Europe was “well placed” for this debate, the Assembly pointed out, since all former European communist countries, with the exception of Belarus, are now its members and the protection of human rights and the rule of law are the basic values for which it stands.
A draft recommendation calling on Europe’s governments to adopt a similar declaration of the international condemnation of crimes of totalitarian communist regimes did not receive the necessary two-thirds majority of the votes cast.
For more information, please visit http://assembly.coe.int or http://www.coe.int/PAsession
Red Mist Descends
By EURSOC One
26 January, 2006
European communists have reacted with fury to the news that the parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe has voted to formally condemn "the crimes of totalitarian communist regimes."
The PACE issued a statement expressing "sympathy, understanding and recognition for the victims of these crimes" which it described as "massive human rights violations... including individual and collective assassinations and executions, death in concentration camps, starvation, deportations, torture, slave labour and other forms of mass physical terror."
It called on communist parties in European states "to reassess the history of communism and their own past […] and condemn them without any ambiguity”.
Fat chance. Russian newspapers reacted predictably, with former Soviet mouthpiece Pravda describing it as a "ridiculous attempt to condemn communism." It also expressed unease over the prospect of Russian officers being categorised as no different from members of the Nazi SS. Russian MPs on the assembly warned that Moscow was opposed to a condemnation.
Russian opposition to the statement is only to be expected: After all, this is a nation where around 50 percent of the population profess an admiration for Stalin and close to that number admit that having a similarly tough guy around might do their country some good.
However, the antics of western socialists and communists are more shameful. The vote, which passed by 99 to 42 (with 12 abstaining), was ferociously opposed by western leftists.
Spain's supposedly moderate socialists opposed the resolution, while the absurd Belgian Communist Party described it as ""a violent attack on history, present and future of communism." Various Greek factions condemned the resolution as "neo McCarthyism" and, laughably, "persecution."
French Communists attempted to throw the Holocaust into the debate, arguing that to compare the horrors of Hitler's Nazis to what they must imagine to be the benign and gentle acts of their heroes "banalises the Holocaust." They added that the resolution ignored the role of Communists in fighting fascism.
Other Communists in France complained that the vote was a capitalist ploy, consigning Communism to the graveyard of history of closing off any alternative to liberalism.
The vote was a belated attempt to recognise the 100 million who have died at the hands of Communist regimes, including over 20 million in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Its sponsor, Sweden's Goran Lindblad, also proposed a memorial day to remember those who were killed by Communist regimes, though this resolution failed to reach the required two-thirds majority.
By EURSOC One
26 January, 2006
European communists have reacted with fury to the news that the parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe has voted to formally condemn "the crimes of totalitarian communist regimes."
The PACE issued a statement expressing "sympathy, understanding and recognition for the victims of these crimes" which it described as "massive human rights violations... including individual and collective assassinations and executions, death in concentration camps, starvation, deportations, torture, slave labour and other forms of mass physical terror."
It called on communist parties in European states "to reassess the history of communism and their own past […] and condemn them without any ambiguity”.
Fat chance. Russian newspapers reacted predictably, with former Soviet mouthpiece Pravda describing it as a "ridiculous attempt to condemn communism." It also expressed unease over the prospect of Russian officers being categorised as no different from members of the Nazi SS. Russian MPs on the assembly warned that Moscow was opposed to a condemnation.
Russian opposition to the statement is only to be expected: After all, this is a nation where around 50 percent of the population profess an admiration for Stalin and close to that number admit that having a similarly tough guy around might do their country some good.
However, the antics of western socialists and communists are more shameful. The vote, which passed by 99 to 42 (with 12 abstaining), was ferociously opposed by western leftists.
Spain's supposedly moderate socialists opposed the resolution, while the absurd Belgian Communist Party described it as ""a violent attack on history, present and future of communism." Various Greek factions condemned the resolution as "neo McCarthyism" and, laughably, "persecution."
French Communists attempted to throw the Holocaust into the debate, arguing that to compare the horrors of Hitler's Nazis to what they must imagine to be the benign and gentle acts of their heroes "banalises the Holocaust." They added that the resolution ignored the role of Communists in fighting fascism.
Other Communists in France complained that the vote was a capitalist ploy, consigning Communism to the graveyard of history of closing off any alternative to liberalism.
The vote was a belated attempt to recognise the 100 million who have died at the hands of Communist regimes, including over 20 million in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Its sponsor, Sweden's Goran Lindblad, also proposed a memorial day to remember those who were killed by Communist regimes, though this resolution failed to reach the required two-thirds majority.
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