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PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC SUPPORT ADOPTION OF WAR GRAVES ACT IN SECOND READING
Letter of Appeal by President Milan Kucan to deputies of the National Assembly
Draft translation
Ljubljana, 15 April 2002
Honourable Deputies of the National Assembly,
At its April session the National Assembly will also be debating and deciding on the War Graves Act in its second reading. You are facing an historic task. I call on you to pass this bill (of 22 November 2001) with the Governments amendments (of 4 February 2002) and the amendment of the Committee of the National Assembly on Health, Labour, Family, Social Policy and the Disabled (of 8 March 2002) concerning Article 13 regulating inscriptions on the graves of war victims and post-war victims of summary executions. I also call on you to withdraw the amendments you filed during the adoption process, thus enabling the adoption of the Act.
This Act repays the moral debt of the Slovenian state towards all people, Slovenes and others, who lost their lives on our territory in the apocalypse of the Second World War and in the violence that was to follow immediately thereafter. It is of particular import to us Slovenes that our Slovenian homeland, brought into existence by the plebiscite decision of 1990, express through this Act its willingness to treat decently and respectfully all those that perished in that time. Today, it is you, honourable Deputies, that represent the Slovenian homeland and state. It is up to you to adopt a decision expressing, if passed, the resolve of our homeland to bury its dead children taken away from its by the violent time of war and the ideological and political score settling immediately after the war. Their paths to the grave were different, but yonder side of death all deserve the same human dignity. Judgments about their lives should never deny their right to a tombstone. Piety towards the dead is the foundation of human culture. There can be no tolerance among the living without it.
I turn to you, honourable Deputies, inviting you to adopt the Act with that thought and resolve in mind. This the past would finally become history. The dead should no longer burden the living, the conflicts and sins of fathers should no longer burden their children and grandchildren.
Keep in mind that this Act is not an act about writing history or expressing judgment. History already happened. We cannot repair it, we cannot change it. European and American historians have already acknowledged Slovenia's place in the historical struggle for the defence of human dignity, freedom and democracy during the Second World War, recognising the important role and contribution of the Slovenian fight for liberation to the success of the Allied coalition's struggle against nazism. The events of those times among us Slovenes, however, is in the hands of our own historians.
With the political statement on that period in history and those actions the National Assembly remains indebted to its own resolutions and commitments, as well as the expectations and the will of the citizens of Slovenia expressed at the plebiscite about the independent Slovenian state being a state belonging to all Slovenes, who would also jointly bear responsibility for that state, regardless of their past actions. Once the National Assembly completes this task, it will be meaningful, along with the ongoing criminal investigations as to the summary executions, to also undergo the final symbolic act of reconciliation and civic appeasement, erecting a monument to all Slovenes ripped away from the Slovenian nation by the supreme evil of war and all of its consequences. It should be, as I already proposed to the National Assembly on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the end of World War II, a monument of the Slovene state to all victims laid on the stone of sacrifice by our Slovenian nation in the various battlegrounds, murder grounds and torture chambers at home and abroad, both during the war and in summary executions immediately following the war. Through these acts of piety, including the Book of the Dead, listing all Slovene victims of World War II, the issuing of death certificates to their families if they so desire, the maintenance of Partisan gravesites and monuments to hostages, monuments to the National Liberation War, as well as memorial parks in Kočevski Rog and Teharje, we – their heirs – accept all of them as our own, finally burying them in reconciliation and appeasement among the living, joining our forces for the future of Slovenia and its people without having to bear the burdens of the past. It is on us that this fate depends, it is our responsibility to our ancestors and future generations.
These actions are not about giving up history, for without our own history we would have no proper foundations. We also cannot and will not erase this history from memory. We want and must overcome the hatred and the grudges of the past that are burdening our lives and making difficult our cooperation for the future of our nation. Our personal judgments of the erstwhile events are and will probably remain varied. In a democratic and responsible society this cannot be a burden. It is important, however, that in spite of our differences we are willing and capable of living together in tolerance with mutual respect and a sense of responsibility for the future of the Slovene nation and its state. I believe that as a people, as a nation, we are spiritually and nationally mature enough to do so. Your decision passing this bill, honourable Deputies, would be confirmation of that strength and clarity of mind; I lay my trust in your historic judgment and moral strength.
Honourable Deputies, you are facing an historic decision as you are passing this bill in its second reading. Sooner or later someone shall have to take this decisive step finally allowing us to reconcile with our past and with one another. Your decision in favour of this bill will not leave that decision to future generations, who would find it difficult to understand why, in the name of the past, that dividing hatred, after so many decades, still had more power than piety towards the dead and responsibility for the future. I am convinced that your decision in support of the proposal will enable the adoption of the act in its third reading, thus drawing a painful chapter in our history to a close.
Stand convinced that Slovenes of all generations will be grateful for your sober and responsible action.
Milan Kučan
Ljubljana, 15 April 2002
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