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Condemning totalitarian Communism
Resolution adopted by the XVIth EPP Congress
In the 20th Century, there evolved two equally inhumane
totalitarian regimes – Communism and Nazism, both of which resulted
in millions of victims. The defeat of Nazism in the 2nd World War
allowed its crimes to be investigated and condemned, and the guilty
persons to be tried. The Communist system has collapsed, but a similar
international condemnation has not followed.
- having regard to the declarations
of most national parliaments in the States affected;
- whereas nazi and fascist-totalitarianism
has been rightly condemned internationally, but that totalitarian
Communism has not yet been condemned from a moral perspective;
- whereas in different parts of the world
a few totalitarian Communist regimes are still clinging to power
at high cost to the well-being of their people;
- whereas the danger of totalitarian Communist
regimes regaining power has not disappeared, and this ideology
continues to endanger world peace and the free development of
nations;
- whereas the fight against fascism has demonstrated
that the demolition of a regime does not defeat an ideology, and
that the memory of the crimes committed must be maintained in
order to prevent revival of totalitarian ideologies and practices.
1. Underlines the fact that totalitarian Communist regimes in Central
and Eastern Europe murdered millions of innocent people of all nationalities
and damaged many others by causing serious violations of human rights,
particularly:
- deportation of millions of people to Siberia
and other locations, including the old, the sick, pregnant women,
children and babies;
- removal of entire populations from their
countries of origin;
- persecution and unfair trials of political
opponents of the dictatorship;
- fixed elections leading to illegitimate
Parliaments and the usurping of power and de facto imposition
of such regimes;
- inhumane treatment and torture in concentration
camps, prisons and detention centres, especially of political
prisoners and detainees;
- persecution based on ethnic grounds, often
equal to genocide;
- persecution based on religious grounds;
- persecution based on social origin;
- total control by the security services over
the lives of people and violation of their privacy;
- proclaiming and promoting an ideology of
hatred;
- forbidding freedom of association and freedom
of assembly;
- restriction of free movement within the
state and abroad;
- serious violations of political pluralism,
of freedom of conscience, and of freedom to express political
views other than totalitarian Communist ideology;
- denial of access to free information and
complete lack of press freedom;
- expropriation of land and other forms of
private property;
- support for revolutionary communist movements
which fought outside of the democratic arena;
- Export of financial resources abroad the
destiny of which remains unclear to this date but which definitely
belong to the people of the States concerned;
2. considers that every victim of any totalitarian regime is equal
in dignity and deserves justice;
3. is concerned about the lack of proper international evaluation
to date of the huge loss of human lives and the sufferings of millions
of people in Central and Eastern Europe;
4. notes that after the collapse of these regimes important historical
research has been done;
5. urges the complete revelation of the truth about the crimes of
communism during the period of totalitarian regimes as a vehicle for
the moral resurgence of society in the post-totalitarian Europe;
6. urges the creation of an independent expert body for the collection
and assessment of information about violations of human rights during
totalitarian communism;
7. invites Member states and accession countries to set up national
committees to investigate violations of human rights committed during
the totalitarian communist regimes, which should report their findings
to the independent body;
8. invites Member states and accession countries to lift all confidentiality,
if such still exists, of documents which could illuminate the cases
connected with crimes committed during the communist regimes, especially
those committed by the secret services and political police, and encourage
citizens to come forward and bear witness to such events before the
above independent body and national committees;
9. on the basis of the information collected and assessed by the independent
body:
- calls for the European Union to
adopt an official declaration for the international condemnation
of totalitarian communism;
- calls for the setting up of a European research
and documentation centre, to continue collecting, assessing and
publishing information about totalitarian communism, and provide
a focus for further study and historical research;
- invites the designation of a “Day of Victims”
of the totalitarian Communist regimes;
- creation of a memorial museum of victims
of communism.
10. calls on all those who intend to assume a political function in
the EU institutions to disclose their professional and political activities
in former communist states and to refrain from taking up a European
post if they formed part of the repressive Communist enforcement agencies,
or were involved in crimes against humanity.
Source: EPP-ED
Group in the European Parliament
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