Main focus of Wednesday, April 11, 2007

History is poisoning relations between Moscow and its neighbours

In certain new EU Member States, relations with Moscow are very difficult because of historical conflicts inherited from the 20th century. The implications of this can be very big, as is apparent in the case of Estonia facing a Russian boycott of its exports.

The Guardian - United Kingdom

"In the west, the memory of the anti-fascist coalition is largely still intact, and only a few extremists claim it would have been better to have been allied with Hitler against the Soviet Union. But in the east, the fall of the Berlin wall created a vacuum in history", writes Gyula Hegyi, a socialist MEP from Hungary. "The new politicians and media failed to tell the complicated truth about the war, the old pro-Soviet cliches were replaced by anti-Soviet cliches. The tragedy of the Baltic republics under Soviet rule does not change the fact that the death camps of Auschwitz were created by the Nazis and liberated by the Red Army. And the crimes of the Stalinist regime do not alter the fact that millions of Soviet soldiers died for the freedom of Europe. The Baltic republics should remember Stalin's victims, and we have to understand their mixed feeling towards Russia. But those who sacrificed their lives against the Nazi regime should be heroes for every democrat." (11/04/2007)

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More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » History, » Russia, » Central Europe, » South East Europe
All available articles from » Gyula Hegyi

Le Soir - Belgium

The Museum of Auschwitz has just postponed the opening of an exhibition on the role of the Red Army in the liberation of this death camp. "At the heart of the quarrel is the identity of several groups of prisoners killed by the Nazis", explains Benjamin Quénelle. Many came from annexed parts of the USSR resulting from the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact which, in 1939, had fixed the division of territory in central and northern Europe between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. "When they were taken prisoner on the former Polish territory of the USSR, were these people still Polish, or already Soviet ? In the eyes of Moscow, they were Soviet citizens. For the museum officials they were Polish, Lithuanian, etc. ... These debates are occurring just as the situation between the two countries [Russia and Poland] is particularly fraught. ... Relations are bad and the slightest incident risks being blown well out of proportion. And as is often the case in relations between Russia and its former satellite countries, it is history, more than anything else, that continues to haunt it. " (11/04/2007)

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More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » History, » Poland, » Russia, » Eastern Europe
All available articles from » Benjamin Quénelle

Delfi - Estonia

The dispute over the Soviet monument in Tallinn has been taking its toll on relations between Estonia and Russia for a while now. The Estonians want the statue removed from central Tallinn, while the country's Russian minority stoutly opposes the move. The commentator for the online news agency Delfi compares the statue with a Soviet monument in Budapest, saying that the latter is justified because 80,000 Soviet soldiers fell in the battle for the Hungarian capital. However the monument in Tallinn is not justified because the Nazis voluntarily withdrew from the city: "The government in Hungary is considering holding a referendum on the removal of the monument. In Tallinn, no one has thought of asking the people. Instead, some call for the statue to be razed or at least removed, while others want it to remain where it is. Under these circumstances a compromise seems highly unlikely. Yet the new right-wing conservative government in Estonia owes its success in the last elections at least in part to the fact that former and current Prime Minister Andrus Ansip promised to remove the stature from the city centre. Which of the two monuments will come down first? Unfortunately, it seems probable that despite everything it will be the one in Budapest." (11/04/2007)

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More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » History, » Hungary, » Estonia, » Russia

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