crimes committed by totalitarian regimes - Ministrstvo za pravosodje

Crimes committed by totalitarian regimes
not, we have to live with our past. And do we not want to explain to our children who it is sitting on that
iron horse, or who is hiding behind that wall inscription? Memories have to be tangible to be understood
and to build a bridge to the present.
Monuments that memorialise new totalitarian crimes can be convincing if they convey the emotional
message. The Jewish Museum in Berlin does this, while the Imperial War Museum in London leaves
many questions open. I am ambivalent about new memorial days. Not only because of the predictable
speeches: I also wonder about the attitude of young people. Two years ago, a Czech writer told me:
“The minds of my parents were captured and paralysed by the Nazi occupation. Mine was imprisoned
by the Soviet regime. It was difficult to communicate. My children do not care about either.”
Research, especially cross-border research, is important. Hard facts need to be presented at a time
when populist movements east and west, north and south of Europe attempt to condone, deny or grossly
trivialise war crimes, crimes of genocide, and crimes against humanity. But will the hearts of the next
generation be moved by thousands of dissertations? The findings have hardly entered the very few
cross-border history schoolbooks that do exist. I allow myself this critical remark because I, too, wrote
a dissertation on an aspect of this topic.
Cultural and artistic means, using present-day technological possibilities, might get us further.
For instance, the winner of the Palme d’Or and the FIPRESCI Award at last year’s Cannes Film
Festival, the Romanian film 4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days, deals with abortion on the surface but in
reality reveals the mechanisms, shortcomings and atrocities of everyday life during the dictatorship of
Ceausescu. Likewise, the Oscar-winning German film The Life of the Others meticulously scrutinises
the work of the secret police in the former German Democratic Republic.
7. What role for the EU?
Comparable but not necessarily award-winning films deserve more financial support for Europewide
distribution by the Commission. Distribution is the weakest part of the EU’s Media Policy.
Novels, too, can lead to greater understanding more effectively than cold facts and figures. I dare
to say this even though I am an historian. Just recall La sombra del viento (The Shadow of the Wind), in
which Carlos Ruiz Zafón brings the times of Franco in Barcelona to life; or Het verdriet van Belgie (The
Sorrows of Belgium) by the great Flemish writer Hugo Claus, who died recently; or Die Blechtrommel
(The Tin Drum) by Günter Grass; or the haunting novel about humiliation, fear and power struggles
during the dictatorial times in Albania, The Successor, by Ismael Kadare, not exactly a dissident but a
great writer; or De Brug (The Bridge) in which Dutch author Geert Mak subtly but emphatically evokes
the multicultural togetherness of people around the Galata Bridge in Istanbul, thereby convincingly
questioning the oft-heard cliché that Islamic means fanatic and that means totalitarian.
Comic books – in print and on the internet – are popular and deserve mention. Think of Persepolis –
une enfance en Iran (A childhood in Iran) by Marjane Satrapi; Die Suche (The search), a comic series
on the Holocaust, commissioned by the Berlin Anne Frank Centre and realised by the Dutch cartoonist
Eric Heuvels, and which is now a set text in history lessons in some schools in Berlin and in North
Rhine-Westphalia.
Translations of relevant titles – especially translations from and into smaller language-areas in
the broader Europe – deserve more support than hitherto. There is also a need for professional training
schemes for translators in these countries, especially in Central and Eastern Europe. A collection of best
practices of pedagogical projects dealing with the very different totalitarian pasts in the broader Europe
should also be envisaged: again, a task that no nation can or will do by itself.
Many more artistic examples could be listed, from photo/video/computer art to city planning,
monument protection, the performing arts, the fine arts and other fields. Take just one example: in
Barcelona’s Circulo de Arte, Goya’s deeply moving drawings Pinturas negras (The Horrors of War –
the Napoleonic wars of 1812–1816) are now exhibited in dialogue with the drawings Wir sind nicht
die Letzten (We are Not the Last Ones) made by the Italian-Slovenian artist Zoran Mušič in Dachau
concentration camp.
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