Unofficial translation

Appeal

of the State Duma

to the parliaments of the countries of Europe, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, the European Parliament concerning an insult to the memory of the soldiers who fell when liberating Europe from Nazism, victims of the Holocaust and other crimes against humanity committed by the Nazis and their collaborators during the Second World War

The Deputies of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation appeal to the parliaments of the countries of Europe and European parliamentary institutions to resolutely condemn the cases which have recently become more frequent of destruction and desecration of the monuments and memorials erected in honor of the soldiers of the states of the anti-Hitler coalition who gave their lives for the liberation of Europe from Nazism. There can be no forgiveness to those who insult the memory of soldiers and officers of the Red Army, partisans, resistance fighters, victims of the Holocaust and other crimes against humanity committed by the Nazis and their collaborators during the Second World War.

Hitler's slaughterers, whose hands are coated with the blood of millions of innocent victims, are the ideological abettors of those who are trying to make political capital and fanning extremely dangerous nationalist and revanchist sentiments among the populations of some European states today, in particular in Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Ukraine.

The aspiration of unprincipled politicians to rewrite the history and revise the results of the Second World War is growing right before our eyes. For example, one cannot consider otherwise the fact that the “Decommunization Law” of April 1, 2016 and the its amendments which have been recently adopted by the Polish Sejm, Senate and signed by the President set forth the possibility to demolish and dismantle almost 500 monuments and memorials in honor of the Red Army soldiers who liberated Poland. There were the Russians, the Byelorussians, the Ukrainians, the Jews, the Azerbaijanis, the Kazakhs, the Armenians, the Kirghiz and other representatives of the victorious Soviet people among them.

The decisions which are similar to the blasphemous act of the Polish authorities and based on the desire to belittle the decisive role of the Red Army in the liberation of Europe and the world from the fascist invaders, condone the criminal "logic" of the glorification of Nazism and, as a consequence, that a young generation who is unaware of the most terrible war of the 20th century grows up in Europe. A breeding ground for terrorism, interethnic and interreligious hostility emerges where Bandera or the Baltic "forest brothers" are imposed as examples to follow.

The Deputies of the State Duma urge European parliamentarians to unite their efforts to counter any attempts to revive fascism in any of its manifestations and to glorify Hitler's slaughterers and their collaborators; to resist strictly the destruction or desecration of monuments and memorials to the soldiers who liberated Europe from Nazism; to incorporate truthful materials reflecting the decisive role of the Red Army in the Victory over Nazism, the lessons of the Holocaust, the harmfulness of collaborationism and any forms of complicity with the Nazi invaders and their contemporary followers in the curricula of the educational institutions in the European states.

The State Duma urges the parliaments of the European states and international parliamentary organizations to take all possible measures, primarily of a legislative nature, so that a mutually respectful attitude towards historical memory and respect for the feats of the millions of people who gave their lives for the liberation of Europe from the "brown plague" serve as a solid basis for the present good-neighborly civilized relations in our common European home which freedom was won by our grandfathers and fathers. It is a sacred duty and responsibility of a free Europe citizen to be worthy of the memory of the fallen in the fight against the fascist invaders and their accomplices!

The Speaker of the State Duma

of the Federal Assembly

of the Russian Federation                                                                                                                     Vyacheslav Volodin

Moscow

July 19, 2017