crimes committed by totalitarian regimes - Ministrstvo za pravosodje

Crimes committed by totalitarian regimes
USSR Bolshevism committed mass crimes against humanity in Latvia by punishing hundreds
of thousands merely for their social origin and political conviction, exiling them from the occupied
territories. The USSR Bolshevik regime, like the National Socialist regime, persecuted people for their
social and national origin, religious belief and political conviction, that is, for reasons not dependent on
the persons themselves or, in other words, for their “indigenous sin”.
We have to reject the opinion that political persecutions of people stopped after Stalin’s death. In
the period from 1954 to 1985, 2,451 persons were arrested and sentenced for political crimes in Latvia 26 ,
of which 249 (10 %) for agitation and propaganda against the Soviets. In total, 188,923 persons (9.45 %)
were politically persecuted in Latvia 27 by Bolshevik occupation forces in the years from 1940 to 1985.
That would be equal to 7.3 million political prisoners in Germany in 1938 (out of 69.3 million). Of all
political detainees, 54,000 persons were later sentenced (28.6 %). 28
Table 5:
Number of people politically persecuted by two totalitarian regimes in Latvia, 1940–91
No. Regime Number Of all Latvian
citizens (%)
Victims of Nazism
and Communism (%)
1. Politically persecuted by the Nazis
(1941–44)
2. Politically persecuted by the
Bolsheviks (1940–41, 1944–91)
80,000 4.0 29.7
188,923 10.4 70.3
Total 268, 923 14.4 100.0
Table 5 shows that during both totalitarian regimes, nearly one-third of a million Latvian citizens
were politically punished (shot, killed in a concentration camp or imprisoned). The Bolsheviks persecuted
more than twice as many people (10.4 %) as the Nazis (4 %). A large portion of the politically punished
families served their punishment in Siberia in special settlements (colonies) controlled by the USSR
IeTK–VDK. Regretfully, the Western democracies have to date not condemned the crimes committed
by the Bolsheviks in the period 1940–80, and remain reluctant at least to recognise those crimes as
legally equivalent to the Nazi’s crimes.
All crimes against humanity and the genocide committed by the Bolshevik regime were executed
by criminal organisations: VK(b)P (PSKP), Central Committee, Politburo, Secretaries (leaders) of
Committees at state, regional and local levels, who represented 7–10 % of Party members. With regard
to Latvia, there were some 20,000 such organisers of genocide who to date have not been publicly
condemned, yet alone convicted or punished. In Latvia, eight persons have been sentenced life
imprisonment for genocide crimes, and one person for war crimes – all of them leaders or executives of
the then power structure. The leaders and organisers of the Bolshevik crimes from the nomenclature of
the SU Communist Party, however, have so far remained without condemnation and punishment.
When analysing the common and the different characteristic features of either totalitarian regime
in relation to political persecution of the Latvian civil population, we can state that, first, both regimes
punished people by virtue of attributes they could not change – the Nazis for their race, the totalitarian
Communism – primarily for their social origin. Second, both criminal regimes punished whole families,
including women, children and the elderly. Third, both regimes also destroyed people with forced
labour. Fourth, both criminal regimes usually punished political prisoners in large groups and secretly,
without a trial. Fifth, the Nazis punished approximately one third, and the totalitarian Communists
approximately two thirds of the politically repressed. Sixth, the Bolsheviks did not only deprive the
politically repressed of their own freedom, but also limited the freedom of their selected close relatives
with regard to their lodgings, education, profession, and travel abroad for all of their lives. Consequently,
26
H. Strods, “Hauptnormen und Ziele des Genozids in Lettland vom 1940–85”, Praxis des kommunistischen Totalitarismus und des Genozides
in Lettland. Konferenzmaterialien, Riga 1992, p. 19. (H. Strods, “Main Forms and Goals of Genocide in Latvia from 1940 to 1985”,
in: Practice of Communist Totalitarianism and Genocide in Latvia. Conference materials, Riga 1992, p. 18.
27
I. Zalite, Repressive Action of the Communist Regime and its Consequences in Latvia, p. 1. (Computer of TDSC).
28
“Data from the State Archives of Latvia. Sal.”, in: A. Plakans (ed.), Experiencing Totalitarism. The Invasion and Occupation of Latvia by
the USSR and Nazi Germany, 1939–1991, 2007, p. 374.
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