Remembering atrocities – now more than ever!

In the night from February 27 to 28, 2024, an arson attack was carried out on the Latvian Occupation Museum in the capital Riga. The museum documents the events and history of Latvia during the Soviet and National Socialist occupation. One focus is on the second Soviet occupation from 1944, which only ended with independence in 1990/91. With 100,000 visitors a year, it is the most visited museum in Latvia.

“This attack was a long-planned attack. It is not only an attack on the museum, but also on the foundations of the Latvian state, the constitution and the truth. Nevertheless, we will not be deterred from continuing our work,” writes Solvita Viba, the director of the museum, in an email to the German section of the ISHR.

Latvian Occupation Museum in Riga; Photo: E. Lamm/IGFM

A museum normally documents the past. In this case, it could be the other way around. Putin’s threats to the Baltic states make the displays in the Latvian Occupation Museum seem like a prediction of what could happen again:

“Especially in this day and age, it is the task of our museum to show how the Russian side uses obviously false representations to obscure the past and intimidate its neighbors in the present. Our historical presentation in the museum confirms that much of what is happening in Ukraine has happened before and will happen again if it is not stopped. The human rights violations in Ukraine in turn reinforce our depiction of the Soviet regime’s disregard for human rights. And that the threat is not local, but universal,” writes Professor Valters Nollendorfs in an email on March 1.

In July 2022, a delegation from the German section of the ISHR visited the Occupation Museum as part of a multi-year project to describe and analyze the communist injustice. Since then, there has been a deep friendship with mutual visits with the founder of the museum, Professor Valters Nollendorfs, who is now also a member of the board of trustees of the German section of the ISHR.