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Joint Statement by the President of the Republic, the Chairman of the Riigikogu and the Prime Minister of the Republic of Estonia on Mourning Day, on 14 June 2003
13.06.2003


Dear fellow countrymen!


There are crimes which will never be forgotten and which will have no limitation of time. Sixty-two years ago more than ten thousand people were arrested at their home in Estonia and deported to unknown Siberia in cattle wagons. This was neither the first nor the last crime the regime of violence committed. Over the years, tens of thousand of people were deported and arrested in occupied Estonia. On 14 June we commemorate all of them.

If we were to forget these crimes, we would lose our idea of freedom against which the very same terror was aimed. Totalitarianism and fear will lose ground as democratic traditions and institutions strengthen and freedom of speech and action spread. Thus, we are not any longer alone also in our pain of loss. Today, the norms of international law, which the then occupants viciously ignored, have become common European values.

However, we have a lot to do for remembrance of victims. We have a lot to do also after June 27 when we will open Museum of Occupations in Tallinn, which will remind us and most of all our children and our guests of grievous times we have survived in our history. We also have to restore the Memorial Church to Estonian Soldiers at Tori. The eighty-five-year-old Republic of Estonia has not yet opened a memorial in commemoration of the people who have fought, suffered and fallen for the independence of its nation.

Today, we remember men, women and children who were violently separated from their kin, home and fatherland - without any hope to return. We remember those whose last resting place is in foreign soil.


Arnold Rüütel
President of the Republic

Ene Ergma
Chairman of the Riigikogu

Juhan Parts
Prime Minister of the Republic


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