By: Stefan
J. Bos,
Chief International Correspondent, BosNewsLife
13 October 2004
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from the country side in October 1941 [Photo credit: Frontline] <bosnewslife.com/article/2/1/4/32/6.aspx> |
President Ion Iliescu, an ex-Communist who will face an election challenge in November, said Romania "must not forget or minimize the darkest chapter of Romania's recent history" when it was a close ally of Nazi Germany. "Jews" he said "were the victims of the Holocaust."
Illiescu spoke at a joint session of both parliament houses Tuesday, to mark Romania's first Holocaust Day, following a diplomatic row with Israel.
Last year Israeli and Jewish leader were angered by a Romanian government statement denying the Holocaust took place on its territory. President Illiescu said "the young generations need to know and understand the entire truth" about the Holocaust.
Source: http://www.bosnewslife.com/article/2/1/4/32/6.aspx
from
Iliescu Admits Romania's Role in the Holocaust
Tue Oct 12, 2004 01:19 PM ET
By Radu Marinas
BUCHAREST (Reuters) - President Ion Iliescu on Tuesday admitted Romania's complicity in the Holocaust, ending decades of denial that hundreds of thousands of Jews were killed in the country when it was an ally of Nazi Germany.
"We must not forget or minimize the darkest chapter of Romania's recent history, when Jews were the victims of the Holocaust," Iliescu told a joint session of both parliament houses to mark Romania's first Holocaust Day.
As late as last year Israel and Jewish leaders were angered by a Romanian government statement denying the Holocaust took place on its territory.
The diplomatic clash with Israel prompted Romania, eager to please its new, Western partners after 40 years of communism, to revise its line on the issue.
Holocaust Day is officially Oct. 9, commemorating the mass deportation of Jews to ghettos and forced labor camps in 1941. But memorial events including a joint parliament session, exhibitions and shows were moved to Tuesday this year to avoid coinciding with a Jewish holiday.
In an address to MPs and Jewish leaders, Iliescu admitted that death trains, mass deportations and pogroms took place in Romania during World War II and that anti-Semitism was a state-sponsored ideology even before the war started in 1939.
About 420,000 of Romania's pre-war 750,000-strong Jewish community were killed during the war. This includes about 100,000 Jews deported to Auschwitz from Transylvania, then part of Hungary, also a Nazi ally.
Iliescu, an ex-communist who has ruled the Balkan country for all but four years since the 1989 collapse of communism, said Romania's wartime leader Ion Antonescu and his fascist Iron Guard were responsible.
"Taking the blame for the past means that we not only exercise our honesty but prove our democratic convictions," Iliescu said.
The Romanian government, working hard to integrate with Western institutions such as NATO and the European Union, has said it will teach the Holocaust in Romanian schools.
It has set up a special committee headed by Auschwitz survivor and Nobel Prize laureate Elie Wiesel to study Romania's Holocaust. Its findings are expected by next month.
FROM: World
Briefings
The New York Times
October 13, 2004
ROMANIA: LEADER ADMITS NATION'S ROLE IN HOLOCAUST President President Ion Iliescu admitted Romania's complicity in the Holocaust, ending decades of denial that hundreds of thousands of Jews were killed in the country when it was an ally of Nazi Germany. "We must not forget or minimize the darkest chapter of Romania's recent history, when Jews were the victims of the Holocaust," Mr. Iliescu told Parliament. He also said the Holocaust would be taught in Romanian schools. The government has been working hard to please its new Western partners and to integrate with NATO and the European Union. (Reuters)
