Centre for Civic Education (CCE), on the occasion of the European Day of Remembrance for Victims of All Totalitarian and Authoritarian Regimes, the Centre for Civic Education (CCE) recalls that our attitude towards victims cannot be reduced to occasional annual messages, but must form part of a lasting state policy of remembrance, education and protection of democratic values.
The totalitarian and authoritarian regimes of the 20th century left behind millions of victims, devastated societies and deep consequences that did not disappear with those regimes. Their legacy persists wherever crimes are relativised, history is interpreted selectively, and institutions fail to explain how such systems emerged and what they were built upon.
CCE warns that the growing normalisation of authoritarian patterns, which we are witnessing both in the region and beyond, is closely linked to the weakness of the culture of remembrance. When institutions remain silent about difficult chapters of the past, revisionism gains ground. When the education system fails to explain to young people the mechanisms of repression, political control, suppression of freedoms and systematic human rights violations, they are less able to recognise those same mechanisms when they reappear in more contemporary forms. In Montenegro, these issues have been postponed for decades or addressed selectively, often only when they become politically useful, contributing to a weak democratic culture and the absence of serious public dialogue.
The European Parliament designated 23 August as a day of remembrance for the victims of Stalinism and Nazism, sending a clear message that no crime committed in the name of ideology should ever be relativised or forgotten. This date is therefore not only a reminder of the past, but also a warning of how quickly institutions can become instruments of repression when the rule of law, pluralism and checks on power disappear.
For Montenegro, a particularly important part of this history is the experience of political prisoners during the period of Yugoslavia’s conflict with the Cominform. In the former Yugoslavia, 15,737 people were imprisoned on accusations of supporting Stalin, while according to available estimates, more than 3,500 of them were from Montenegro. Many were subjected to torture, hunger, humiliation and other forms of inhuman treatment in camps administered by the UDBA, often without trial or an effective opportunity to defend themselves.
CCE recalls that Montenegro still does not have regular institutional commemoration of 23 August, nor a systematic and modern treatment of this topic in educational programmes. At the same time, the issue of compensation for political prisoners and their families remains legally and politically unresolved, despite being one of the most serious legacies of the repressive system, with lasting consequences for Montenegrin society.
CCE therefore calls on the competent institutions to include 23 August in regular remembrance policies, integrate the topics of totalitarianism and authoritarianism more substantially into educational programmes, and open a serious, academically grounded and politically non-instrumentalised dialogue on repression and its victims.
Victims deserve more than symbolic remembrance. A society that does not understand the mechanisms of its own repressive past remains vulnerable to their recurrence in new forms. This is why facts, education and responsible remembrance are among the strongest safeguards of democracy.
By the Declaration of the European Parliament of 23 September 2008, 23 August was proclaimed the European Day of Remembrance for Victims of Stalinism and Nazism, which was reaffirmed by the European Parliament Resolution on European Conscience and Totalitarianism in 2009.
Alma Hećo, Programme Assistant