Veterans of the anti-fascist fight stand against falsification of history

28. Juli 2009

The International Federation of the Resistance fighters (FIR) – Association of the Anti-fascists, the umbrella organization of federations of former resistance fighters, partisans, members of the anti-Hitler coalition, pursuits of the Nazi regime and antifascist of today’s generations from more than twenty countries of Europe and Israel took knowledge with surprise and indignation of the resolution of the parliamentary assembly of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe from 3 July 2009 to the subject “divided Europe reunited”.

In that way the fascist mass crimes and the illegality in the Stalinist period are placed undifferentiated on the same stage. At the same time therein is assigned to the Soviet Union the same responsibility at provoking the Second World War as Hitler Germany. Such statements do not have anything to do with the historical reality. They falsify history and defame the common fight of the anti-Hitler coalition, in which the Soviet Union had a crucial portion as allied power, against the largest threat of mankind in 20. Century.

We know that the resolution of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe was implemented against the voices by for instance a third of the members of the parliamentary assembly. Thus it is clear that it concerns to the initiators not a political consent as broad as possible, but the establishment of a reactionary history view – based on totalitarianism doctrine and history falsification – into Europe.

Especially in commemoration the 70th anniversary of the aggression of Hitler Germany on Poland and the 20th anniversary of the end of the east west confrontation in Europe it depends however to retain the legacy of the political community of the anti-Hitler coalition for a democratic and peaceful Europe. And if in the explanation the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe the goal is designated “promotion of the human rights and the civil liberties “, then we remind of the oath of the survivors of the KZ Buchenwald, which summarized the community of the anti-Hitler coalition with the following words: “Destruction of the Nazism with its roots, creation of a new world of peace and freedom!”

That is and remains our goal for a reunited Europe.