Doc. 9940 2^nd edition

4 November 2003

A threat to the reconciliation of European nations

Written Declaration No. 347

This written declaration commits only the members who have signed it

      The period of the Second World War and the post-war period saw many tragedies of states, nations, families and individuals on both sides of the fronts of this war.

      A memory of those tragic events will always remind us of the threats which the totalitarian ideologies – Nazism and communism – brought to the European nations.

      A memory of individual suffering, which was a common experience throughout Europe, may not lead to any distortion in the division between the aggressors – Hitler’s Germany and the communist Soviet Union – and the victims.

      The German project for the Centre against Expulsions may lead to such a deformation of the historical memory of Europe.

      We strongly object to its establishment.

Signed (see overleaf)

Signed: ¹

Libicki, Poland, EDG

Atkinson, United Kingdom, EDG

Belohorská, Slovakia, EDG

Cabrnoch, Czech Republic, EDG

Chapman, United Kingdom, EDG

Čurdová, Czech Republic, SOC

Dalgaard, Denmark, EDG

Giertych, Poland, EDG

Grabowski, Poland, EDG

Grzyb, Poland, EPP/CD

Hladiy, Ukraine, EDG

Hooper, United Kingdom, EDG

Klich, Poland, EPP/CD

Klympush, Ukraine, EDG

Kostenko, Ukraine, EPP/CD

Lachnit, Czech Republic, SOC

Lozančić, Bosnia and Herzegovina, NR

Melčák, Czech Republic, SOC

Nĕmková, Czech Republic, EDG

Ouzký, Czech Republic, EDG

Smorawiński, Poland, EPP/CD

Tkáč, Slovakia, EDG

Wielowieyski, Poland, EPP/CD

Wilkinson, United Kingdom, EDG

Zieliński, Poland, EPP/CD

Markowski, Poland, EPP/CD

__________________________

Total = 26

¹        SOC: Socialist Group

      EPP/CD: Group of the European People’s Party

      EDG: European Democratic Group

      LDR: Liberal, Democratic and Reformers’ Group

      UEL: Group of the Unified European Left

      NR: not registered in a group