crimes committed by totalitarian regimes - Ministrstvo za pravosodje

Crimes committed by totalitarian regimes
The decisive blow to Slovene economy was delivered in the form of financial aid cancellation.
In 1928, the Fascists dissolved the Management and Supervisory Boards of Slovene Cooperative
Associations in Trieste and Gorizia. The former was composed of 140 cooperatives (of which there were
86 credit unions) with a total membership of 45,000, while the latter joined together 170 cooperatives
(including 70 credit unions) with a total membership of 47,000. The Act No. 375 of 12 March 1936 and
the Royal Decree No. 1400 of 17 July 1937 provided for the state’s complete nationalization and loan
concentration, as well as for exclusion of any foreign capital. The remaining Slovene financial institutions
and credit unions were either abolished or forced to merge with their Italian counterparts. 4344
2.8. Ecclesiastical conditions
Interestingly, it was in the field of religion that the Slovene language witnessed the longest use.
Eventually, the policy pursued by the civil authorities accompanied by the silence of the Vatican City and
the local church hierarchy (in particular after the Lateran Treaty of 1929) had an increasingly stronger
and faster impact on this area of people’s life. Gradually, the Fascists managed to replace bishops who
were friendly to Slovenes and Croats with those who were loyal to the regime, and persecuted Slovene
and Croatian priests. In 1933, they prohibited the use of Slovene in churches in the Venezia district
(to which the Vatican City did not object), and in 1934 they closed down all Slovene and Croatian
monasteries in Venezia Giulia. 4445
3. Fascism in the Slovene territory during WWII
On 6 April 1941 Yugoslavia was invaded, partitioned and occupied. The Italians occupied the
Slovene regions of Dolenjska and Notranjska and united them into the Ljubljana Province (Provincia
di Lubiana). On 3 May 1941 the Province was formally annexed to Italy, by which the Italians violated
international law according to which it was not allowed to annex an occupied territory prior to the
signing of the peace treaty.
In the spring of 1941, the Italian territory populated by Slovenes thus expanded by some 4,550
square km, while the number of Slovenes living within Italian borders rose from almost 319,000 to
around 700,000. The census conducted by the Italian occupational authorities on 31 July 1941 showed 4546
that the Ljubljana Province’s population totalled 339,751, of which there were 318,773 Slovenes (93.8
%), 13,580 Germans, 5,053 Croats, 511 Serbs, 1,376 citizens of other nationalities (including some
Jews), and only 458 Italians.
The invasion of Yugoslavia did not change the administrative and political system of Venezia
Giulia nor the Fascists’ negative attitude towards the Slovene and Croatian national communities.
The military and civil authorities expected “Slovene irredentism” to gain ground, and their fear must
have facilitated the preservation of police control along the former Rapallo border. In order to suppress
the Slovene resistance, the Fascists formed special police groups that “distinguished themselves” with
their cruelty. In mid-February 1942, they launched major and minor offensive operations, while in the
beginning of spring 1942 they started carrying out repressive measures (they burned down villages and
hanged civilians). 4647 Certain Fascist functionaries justified their acts by quoting Mussolini’s speech
delivered to his military commandants on 31 July 1942 47 48
in Gorizia in which he stressed that he was
not against the expulsion of all Slovenes.
In the meantime, the Fascists administering the Slovene territory lying to the east of the Rapallo
border pursued a milder occupational policy in comparison with their German and Hungarian allies.
They somehow paid respect to Slovene cultural and educational institutions as they wanted to win
the sympathies of the population, which they partly did for some time. 48 49
Even if certain Slovene
intellectuals collaborated with the Italians in the beginning, the relations soon cooled down owing
to the state of war and Partisan actions. The Italian occupiers increasingly modelled themselves on
43
NŠK OZE, HI/Z, Seznam/17 and Področja/17, 18; Čermelj, Slovenci, op. cit., pp. 169, 173. More details in Milan Pahor, Lastno
gospodarstvo jamstvo za obstoj, Trst, SDGZ, 1998.
44
More details in: Pelikan, Tajno delovanje, op. cit.
45
Davide Rodogno, Il nuovo ordine mediterraneo, Bollati Boringhieri, Torino 2003, p. 114.
46
Tone Ferenc, Neupogljivi zakon Rima (La legge inflessibile di Roma), Društvo piscev zgodovine NOB, Ljubljana 2004.
47
Tone Ferenc, La provincia ‘italiana’ di Lubiana, documenti 1941–1942, IFSML, Udine, doc. no. 91.
48
E.g. Bojan Godeša, Kdor ni z nami, je proti nam, CZ, Ljubljana 1995, pp. 73–107.
131