Asociația 21Decembrie 1989
(Photo: Mediafax) I was astonished to read this morning about Teodor (Doru) Maries’s hunger strike over the last 90 days. As far as I know, it has had as good as ZERO media attention. Googling, I found this article in Ziare dating 22nd December 2011 and another in Romania Libera marking the beginning of the hunger strike. Since then, a deafening silence, apart from this one article from Epoch Times dated 7th February – obviously the press is otherwise occupied with the terrible weather conditions and more ‘urgent’ political topics. Another explanation of media silence just read on Facebook is that: “the majority of the press is controlled by PDL. Adevarul is bankrupt, Gandul does not get involved, so there is no newspaper to support anything criticising the government. Leaving aside Antena 3 and Realitatea, all other television channels kneel before Basescu.”
I realise that some see Doru Maries, leader of the association ’21 decembrie 1989′, as controvertial (accused by Iliescu of not being in the least bit a revolutionary, for example, this is not an isolated opinion), but as far as I am concerned, he is a man fighting for recognition of communist crimes committed – and for the ‘revolutionaries’ of 1989 – in any ways that work.
An open letter of support from Timisoara is readable online along with another signed by Sorin Iliesiu and a petition has been circulating over the last 48h (in English), see HERE.
The purpose of his protest is to convince members of the Romanian Parliament to adopt THREE laws:
1) The Law of Imprescriptibility of Crimes Against Humanity committed during the Communist era and during the days of the December 1989 lovilutie – this law was considered constitutional by the European Courts of Human Rights, which recommended that Romania adopt the law immediately. However, its adoption has been ‘inexplicably’ and repeatedly delayed by the Romanian Parliament.
2) The Law of Gratitude towards victims (and their children) of 1989
3) The Law of Lustration which controls the participation of ex-leaders of the Communist dictatorship, especially informants of the communist secret police, in political appointee or civil service positions in the period after the fall of the Communist regime. An excellent and vital law to be applied in Romania, IMHO which would lead to the removal of a great many politicians and civil servants currently in place today.
The adoption of all these laws is absolutely necessary, says the petition letter, for ‘the correct functioning of democracy and of democratic institutions in Romania’.
Doru Maries’s protest has been completely ignored by political leaders now in power. Members of the association 21 decembrie 1989 are extremely concerned by Maries’s condition after almost 3 months and fear that this (it is not his first hunger strike) could well be fatal. Doru Maries is not alone in his protest – he has been joined by three other members of the association:
Vlad Ciobanu – vice-president of 21 Decembrie 1989 Association (69 days of hunger strike at the time of writing this post)
Firimita Marian (56 days)
Savin Eugeniu (53 days)
The petitioners hope for strong international support which will convince Romanian political leaders to start negotiations with the association immediately so that the hunger strikes may come to an end and no lives lost.
My comment to that is how will it be possible to have international support when there is absolutely NO media coverage (go figure…). No one knows about this and it has been going on for 90 DAYS!! Please, please pass this blogpost on, regardless of your opinions and what you may feel about Doru. He and his three fellow protesters are doing this for MEMORY, for RESPECT and for crimes against humanity under a wicked, evil regime. They are doing this for justice.
For more on Doru Maries, please see HERE along with the following articles from the BBC and EVZ.
Sursa: Sarah in Romania