Brussels,14 June – The Platform of European Memory and Conscience (PEMC) representatives paid respect to all the victims of mass deportations in Soviet Union and Russian Federation on 14 June in Brussels.

The annual event “Remembering Soviet mass deportations” took place at the Esplanade Solidarność in front of the European Parliament in Brussels and it was organized by MEP Rasa Juknevičienė together with 58 Members of the European Parliament from all 27 EU member states, Informal Remembrance Group at the European Parliament, PEMC, Mission of Ukraine to the European Union, Ukrainian community in Belgium, Lithuanian Embassy and Lithuanian community in Belgium.

“This is unfortunately a very current topic. There are mass deportations of people in Ukraine, it is happening right before our eyes. We need to remember to be able to react to such current tragedies,” said Platform President Marek Mutor during the event.

Brief history of Soviet deportations
Eighty-one years ago, on 14 – 18 June 1941, first mass deportations began in the Baltic states: in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. In five days, at least 205,100 people – women and men, children and infants, diseased and the elderly – were deported. This was the first of several mass deportations from the Baltic region. It is estimated that between 1920 and 1952, a total of 6 million people were forcibly deported by the Soviet regime from all over the USSR and Soviet-occupied countries. Many of them never returned.
In addition, a massive network of Gulag prison camps dotted the map of the Soviet Union. The total number of Gulag prisoners is estimated at 15-18 million, of whom at least 1.5 million perished.
Soviet repression targeted the country’s political, economic and cultural elites: teachers, doctors, politicians, officials and servants of former state institutions, intellectuals, military and police officers, farmers, business-owners, members of political and civil society organisations.