Romanian MPs pass bill introducing jail terms for Holocaust revisionism

[Eriugena]

Romanian MPs pass bill introducing jail terms for Holocaust revisionism

Published: 5/5/2005
BUCHAREST - The upper house of the Romanian parliament on Thursday adopted a bill that makes denying the Holocaust a crime punishable with between six months to five years in prison.


Lawmakers in the Senate voted overwhelmingly in favour of the bill that was first put to parliament in 2002 but repeatedly delayed as political parties argued about its wording and the length of the prison terms. It now includes a definition of the Holocaust as "the systematic, state-sanctioned persecution and annihilation of Europe's Jews by Nazi Germany, its allies and collaborators between 1933 and 1945."


The definition was inserted because Romanian politicians have in the past sought to minimise the role of the country, which was an ally of Nazi Germany until changing sides in 1944, in the war-time persecution of Jews.

The former Social-Democrat government sparked outrage in 2003 when it denied that the Holocaust had also been carried out on Romanian soil between 1940 and 1945.

The bill, which still has to be approved by the Chamber of Deputies, also bans racist and xenophobic organisations and symbols, as well as fascist propaganda and an allegiance to "people guilty of crimes against humanity."

The last provision is considered to be aimed at the lingering personality cult around the pro-Nazi war-time premier Ion Antonescu.

He is blamed for the death of 270,000 Romanian Jews during the war but still considered a hero by many for winning back Romanian territory annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940.

05/05/2005 14:09 GMT
http://www.turkishpress.com/news.asp?id=41492