“Dear Madam President, please cancel this repugnant and utterly disreputable conference praising a well-known Nazi criminal immediately.”
JRI is outraged with the sponsoring of an event by the EU Parliament to glorify notorious Nazi collaborator Aloysius Stepinac. He was the Catholic archbishop of Croatia for the fascist Independent State of Croatia in WWII that was responsible for the wildly sadistic exterminations of Serb, Jewish, Roma and anti-fascist populations. The record is clear that this priest was deeply complicit in this government. A conference is scheduled for March 21, 2023, at the Parliament of the European Union, Antall 6Q1, entitled: “Blessed Aloysius Stepinac, testimony of faith, perseverance and hope.” This outrageous sanitizing of this Nazi collaborator is highly offensive to all those families victimized by fascist atrocities. In response, Barry Lituchy, on behalf of the Jasenovac Research Institute, has submitted the following letter to the President of the EU. The text reads as follows:
To the Honorable Roberta Metsola
President of the European Parliament
March 17, 2023
Dear Madam President,
Over the past 25 years, our organization has been dedicated to preserving the memory of the Holocaust in Yugoslavia, informing the world about the crimes committed there by fascist regimes during the Second World War, and seeking justice for the victims. Our slogan “Let the Truth Be Known” is only the first step towards achieving justice.
We write you today because we are outraged and deeply saddened by the news that the EU Parliament has allowed itself to be used as a sponsor of an event praising the Nazi collaborator Aloysius Stepinac. One can debate the particulars of what a man such as Stepinac did or did not do during World War II. But one cannot dispute the fact that he was a Nazi collaborator of the genocidal Ustashe regime in Croatia (the so-called Independent State of Croatia or NDH) installed by Adolf Hitler in April 1941. While Stepinac collaborated with this regime, it murdered 40,000 Jews, hundreds of thousands of Serbs, and tens of thousands of Romas, as well as tens of thousands of anti-fascist opponents of the regime.
We call on you today to immediately repudiate and cancel this conference which is scheduled to take place on 21 March 2023 from 17:00 to 19:00 in the EU Parliament Antall 6QI entitled: “Blessed Aloysius Stepinac – a testimony of faith, perseverance, and hope.”
It would be an abomination to allow such an event under your auspices.
In today’s New York Times, an editorial (“Qatargate is a Spectacular Scandal and a Warning to Europe,” 17 March 2023) stated flatly that the EU “Parliament’s history shows it to be serially vulnerable to corruption.” Is this conference another case of a cash-for-influence scandal? If so, it needs to be investigated. Do not allow your good reputation to be permanently tarnished by this event.
Dear Madam President, please cancel this repugnant and utterly disreputable conference praising a well-known Nazi criminal immediately.
On behalf of our organization, and on behalf of the Survivors and Victims of the Holocaust in Croatia,
Barry Lituchy, Executive Director, JRI
And an image of the signed letter itself:
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