Lithuania seeking for EU countries' official evaluation of crimes of totalitarian regimes
BNS
Lithuania aspires for the requirement for every European Union (EU) country's having to present government-certified rapports in the debates on evaluation of the crimes of totalitarian regimes to be held by the European Commission (EC) in 2008.
In a seminar that took place in Brussels on Wednesday, an expert group appointed by EU Justice Commissar Franco Frattini provided the EC with their proposals with regards to forming the Commission's position in the debates to take place in June.
As the Lithuanian representative, MP Emanuelis Zingeris told BNS on Wednesday, in seeking to prevent the upcoming debates from becoming "another gathering of anti-communist intellectuals", he suggests the EC should set requirements for every EU nation to present an official rapport on the issue of evaluation of crimes of totalitarian regimes.
Zinger, who is the EU level leader of the government appointed taskforce dealing with evaluation of crimes committed by totalitarian regimes and Chairman of the International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupation Regimes in Lithuania, says that his upheld position has been met with approval, and with regards to crimes of totalitarian regimes, the attention has been focused not only on Nazism and Stalinism, but on other regimes that existed in Europe as well.
The parliament notes that EC's position on this question is to become clear over the next few weeks.
A Russian representative also participated in the seminar in Brussels.
In the EU Justice and Internal Affairs Council meeting in April, Lithuania sought for the text of the underlying decision made by the council to include Lithuania's suggestion to evaluate as equal crimes of Nazism and Stalinism and include their evaluation in the principal EC decision on racism and xenophobia.
After this wasn't done, a decision was made to hold supplementary public European debates on this topic.
Commissar Frattini said in his letter to Zinger on Nov 21st, that EC emphasizes the necessity to remedy the injustice and doesn't dismiss the possibility to make a proposal to the underlying decision, where the totalitarian regime crimes would be evaluated.
Lithuanian Prime Minister Gediminas Kirkilas in the meeting of leaders accentuated Lithuania's preparation to cooperate with the EC and the chairing Slovenia in the first half of 2008 in coordinating public discussions on the topic of crimes committed by totalitarian regimes.
In 1940, Lithuania was occupied by the Soviet Union, later, during the years of World War II, its territory was invaded by the Nazi Germany. After the Red Army pushed German troops back, Lithuania was forced to become a Soviet Union republic once again. 1940 to 1953, Lithuania lost up to one-third of its population to deportations, killings, forced emigration.
30-11-2007
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