ABOUT INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE

«THE HOLOCAUST: REMEMBRANCE AND LESSONS»

( Riga, Latvia, 4 – 5 July, 2006)

 

 

On 4-5 July International conference “The Holocaust: Remembrance and Lessons” took place in Riga. It was organized by Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Republic of Latvia, Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education, Remembrance and Research, The American Jewish Committee and Latvian Transatlantic Organization.   

First of all, we would like to mention the social atmosphere in Latvia which the conference took place in. The 4^th of July is declared the National Day of Holocaust Remembrance. It is not just the formality known only to officials and noted by short articles in mass media. Actions at governmental level and public ones were devoted to this very date. The dwellers of Riga knew about Holocaust Remembrance Day which was confirmed by immense number of hanged out Latvian national flags with black ribbons symbolizing the memory of one of the hardest tragedies of the mankind.

 

 Latvian national flags with black ribbons symbolizing solidarity and mourn for Holocaust victims.

It is clear that the prominent international conference we mentioned here was, first of all, dated for Holocaust Remembrance Day. But there was nothing from the Soviet times - high-flown and pompous, that had little in common with interests of both political establishment and ordinary people. The matter is not only in the opening of the conference by President of Latvia Vaira-Vike Freiberga and participation (exactly participation, not just presence) of Minister of Internal Affairs, Minister of Education and etc. The representatives of Latvia headed by the President spoke about the importance of governmental support of historical memory perpetuation, including Holocaust remembrance, about impossibility to build jural democratic European state without perception of the lessons of the past.

Well-known Israeli professor Yehuda Bauer was introduced to the conference participants with great respect. He gave the key academic lecture “Holocaust in European Context”. The lecture that covered the most important methodological problems of Holocaust study was heard out with great attention (by the way, professor Yehuda Bauer kindly agreed to present “Tkuma” Center with the theses of this lecture to be published in academic series “”Tkuma” Holocaust Library”. Even now you can get acquainted with some theses from his works included into the recently published text-book “Holocaust in Ukraine: Search for Answers to History Questions”.- Dnepropetrovsk, 2005).

Lecture of Prof. Yehuda Bauer

The whole first part of the conference was devoted to the topic “Perpetuation of the Holocaust History as the severest world tragedy”. It was written in the conference Program: “Remembrance of Holocaust tragedy is of great importance for formation and cultivation in the future generation such values as responsibility for maintaining tolerance in the society”.

We would like to remind you that the issue of Holocaust study is spoken about (and not only spoken about, but also worked at with the governmental support) in Latvia – one of the Baltic countries where during Second World War the smallest percent of the Jews survived whom the Nazi exterminated with active abetting of local collaborators. In the modern democratic state these facts are not hushed up, people try to realize them, to repent in the interests of not only Jews, but the Latvians - free citizens of the free democratic country which embodies the All-European and common to all mankind values.

No one says that there are no signs of xenophobia, destructive nationalism or “special attitude” to the representatives of non-indigenous population. For example, not everyone in Latvian society and other countries agrees with the practice of defining who can be considered to be the citizen of Latvia. I do not know any other country where such document as passport of NON-citizen exists.

 Passport of NON-citizen of Latvia

But this and other social and national problems in Latvia are discussed openly, the way it has to be in the democratic European country, an EC member. 

Great respect and gratitude inspire the attitude of the Latvian government and the Latvians to the memory of Holocaust victims. Well-groomed is the memorial in Rumbula forest where, according to the inscription on the stele, in 1941 the Nazi and local collaborators killed more than 25 000 of the Jews – children, women, and the aged – prisoners of Riga ghetto and 1000 of the Jews deported from Germany; in summer 1944 here shot were thousands of men – prisoners of concentration camp “Riga-Kaiserwald”. One can not remain indifferent when looking at dozens, hundreds of stones with the names of the perished people and families. Next to the modern memorial there is a monument created in the Soviet era with inscriptions in Latvian, Russian and Hebrew.

Inscriptions in Rumbula

Conference participants at visiting the Memorial, from left to right:  Prof. Yehuda Bauer, Academic Adviser of International Centre for Holocaust Studies, Yad Vashem (Israel), Prof. David Silberklang, Senior Researcher, Editor of Yad Vashem Studies (Israel), Alla Gerber, President of All-Russia “Holocaust” Foundation (Russia), Ben Helfgott, President of International Academic Board Tkuma (Great Britain)

Back to the conference.  

Holocaust remembrance is not only the inscriptions on the stones and well-groomed graves. Holocaust remembrance is study and teaching the tragedy, popularization of the knowledge about it in the society and formation of special historical awareness.  

At the first session of the conference “Holocaust and Education” the issues of effectiveness and problems in practice of Holocaust history teaching were discussed. The teachers from Ukraine, Russia and Byelorussia discussed with their colleagues from the western countries and Latvia the work of the teachers who actively support the Holocaust tragedy study at schools. The participants discussed the problems of methods of teaching of this subject to students and schoolchildren as well as the problem of struggle against Holocaust denial.

The teachers of Latvian schools have the wide experience in teaching the Holocaust history, and the students use it as the basis for adopting the lessons of tolerance, they are brought up in the atmosphere of aversion of any form of xenophobia, anti-Semitism, national or race intolerance. On the other hand, it was interesting for colleagues to get to know from the speeches of Yuliya Smilyanskaya (Ukrainian Center for Holocaust Studies, Kiev), Dr. Igor Shchupak (All-Ukrainian Center for Holocaust Studies “Tkuma”, Dnepropetrovsk) what was done in respect of Holocaust history teaching in Ukraine – starting from the text-books approved by Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine up to the art contests, seminars and conferences.

“Tkuma” Center presentation at the conference

By the way, some of the Latvian teachers were invited to the next, the 4^th International Pedagogical Conference “Holocaust Lessons – Lessons of Tolerance” which “Tkuma” will held in Kiev on 26-28 of September as a part of actions devoted to the anniversary of Babiy Yar tragedy.

At the second session “Anti-Semitism” discussed was the history of generation and formation of the new forms of Anti-Semitism in XX century and nowadays. The participants of the session, among them Nils Muiżnieks, former Society Integration Minister of Latvia, Alla Gerber, President of All-Russia “Holocaust” Foundation (Russia) Shimon Samuel, Director for  International Relations of Simon Wiesenthal Centre (France) and others discussed the possible methods of prevention of anti-Semitism and other forms of aggression against different religions and ethnic groups.   

The following participants took part in the 3^rd session “Holocaust and Research Study”:

Rabbi Andrew Baker, Director of International Jewish Affairs, American Jewish Committee(AJC), Max Jakobson, Chairman of the Estonian International Commission for the Investigation of Crimes Against Humanity (Finland), Emanuelis Zingeris, Member of Lithuanian Parliament, Chair of the Commission Historians of Lithuania (Lithuania), George D. Schwab, Ph.D. President National Committee on American Foreign Policy ,  academic Adviser of All-Ukrainian Center for Holocaust Studies Tkuma – Dr. Aharon Weiss (Israel) and others. The session, in particular, presented the results of the work of Latvian Committee of Historians regarding the issues of Holocaust history study. Latvian Committee of Historians was established in 1998 by the initiative of President of Latvia Vaira-Vike Freiberga. The main goal of the Committee is to consider the outrages upon humanity in Latvia, as it was written in the document “between two occupations, 1940-1991. At present the Committee has finished its work over 16^th volume devoted to Nazi occupation of Latvia”.

As usual the perfectly organized conference gave rise to great interest not only owing to the speeches, presentations and discussions at the sessions, but also owing to the meetings of scholars and public figures, lobby exchange of views where new ideas and projects were generated. This also adds to significance of the conference in Riga which became the further step in studying Holocaust and in public acknowledgement of Holocaust lessons for democratic Europe.

 Dr. Igor Shchupak