Council of Danzig

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The Council of Danzigers (RdDA), with the representation of the Free City of Danzig incorporated in it since 2005, claims to be the state political government representative of the Free City of Danzig in exile (organs of exile) and thus the legal successor to September 1, 1939 with the beginning of Danzig Volkstag ( legislative branch ), which was dissolved during the Second World War , as well as the Senate ( executive branch , until now perceived separately by the Representation of the Free City of Danzig ).

Views, goals

The RdDA takes the view that the Free City of Danzig will continue to exist de jure as a state and subject to international law . B. no longer its territorial restoration in the form of 1920 to 1939. The mandate and the obligation of the Council of Gdańsk were based at least until 1999 on the basis of the Green Papers of the Gdańsk of 1965 and 1994. From the beginning of its existence, the Council has made petitions and petitions etc. a. to the United Nations , but also for information to individual states such as the USA , Great Britain , Russia and Poland (most recently in 1995, 1998 and 2012), mainly with the request, with his participation, binding solutions of the open, the Free City of Danzig and its population to bring about the relevant issues conclusively and in accordance with international law .

He invokes the sovereignty and state independence from Germany conferred by the League of Nations , as well as the citizenship of his people since January 10, 1920. a. To rehabilitate the German and Polish territorial annexation , the expulsion and lockout of the population as well as the expropriation of private and state property that were believed to have been damaged, the RdDA u. a. the possible - subordinate - joint responsibility of the Free City of Danzig for the Second World War. He also refers to the current discourse in international law publications, e.g. B. from the Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law .

The Gdańsk Council had the task of representing the affected Gdańsk citizens in terms of state politics and international law. Former non-National Socialist leading personalities from Gdańsk were appointed as members of this first council, such as the former Senate President (head of government ) of the Free City of Gdańsk Ernst Ziehm , senators, leaders of the factions of the opposition parties in the Gdańsk People's Day such as Joseph Cierocki , etc.

In a statement issued in 2000, the German government stated, however, that the RdDA's claim that it was an organ in exile of the “former Free City of Danzig” (Section IX of the Potsdam Agreement ) was misleading.

root

The beginnings of the RdDA as an alleged organ in exile can already be found in Lübeck in June 1945 in the local gathering groups of refugees and displaced persons from the Free City of Danzig, which were initially organized by the church, analogous to the beginnings of the social and family gathering movement of the later League of Danzigers (BdDA ). The RdDA was secretly formed by the Danzig pastor Gerhard M. Gülzow on May 10, 1947 out of consideration for the risk of being banned from activity by the British military government and constituted on June 17, 1947 under the leadership of the Danzig notary and lawyer Norbert Sternfeld. In publications, e.g. For example, in newsletters for the Danzigers, he called himself the term “ general agency” until 1949 due to the initially considerable British sensitivity, and he exercised clear caution in his wording.

First primary elections

The first elections to the RdDA took place in accordance with their electoral rules in three steps with two ballots, the first in two parts on June 3 and June 24, 1951 and the second on August 2, 1951. The first democratic electoral period of the Danzig Council began exactly six years after the signing of the Potsdam Protocol . For these council elections, over 53,000 votes were cast by citizens of Gdańsk who were entitled to vote in Germany and West Berlin . The first RdDA consisted of 36 members and thus corresponded numerically to half of the last strength of the People's Day ( Parliament of the Free City of Danzig). Its first president was Edgar Kämmerer, who was succeeded by Rudolf Röckner after his death during the current electoral term. On August 4, 1951, the RdDA elected the Representation of the Free City of Danzig (VdDA) in the Lübeck City Hall as its executive body with Norbert Sternfeld as its president. The first electoral term lasted until April 29, 1962, just over ten years.

The following terms

In the following election periods, II. (April 29, 1962 to 1972, President Hans Thaddey), III. (1972 to 1982) and IV. (1982 to 1993), the number of council members was reduced to 24 each while the length of the electoral term remained the same. In the election periods V. (July 10, 1993 to October 12, 1996), VI. (October 12, 1996 to October 29, 1999) and VII. (October 29, 1999 to October 1, 2005), the duration was shortened to approx. 3 years each and the number of council members was reduced to 15 each. Until 2005, urgent tasks were carried out by a committee of elders between council meetings. The council has always been closely related to the Bund der Danziger (BdDA) e. V. in Lübeck. The dovetailing with the League of Danzigers is justified by the fact that most of the citizens of the Free City of Danzig born before 1945 are organized there. The eighth electoral term (October 1, 2005 to September 3, 2011, President Lothar Schubert) was again increased to six years and thus adapted to the legislative term of the Gdansk Federation at that time. The number of council members has been repeatedly reduced, now to five. The IX. Election period (September 3, 2011 to 2017, President Carl Narloch) was adjusted to a four-year term. The council's five-person strength was increased to seven in 2013.

On March 4, 2017, the seven-person council of Gdańsk (10th term of office) was sworn in again. K.-Jochen Gruch was elected Vice-President of the Council (legislative branch) and the Executive Committee (executive branch), Gruch is the incumbent president in both offices.

Electoral practice, electoral regulations

The RdDA is elected according to democratic principles. He regularly drew up election regulations, e.g. B. those of 1970, 1980, 1991, 1992 which were partially - mostly insignificantly the preamble - changed. Since the penultimate version of the election regulations (2012) of the Council of May 7, 2011, the election of the new Council from the eighth electoral period was carried out indirectly together with the primary election for the Assembly of Delegates of the Federation of Danzig. This means that the voters were instructed during the electoral process that they elect an assembly of delegates through their vote, which will then form the electoral body of the new RdDA for the following electoral period. A personal interlinking of the representatives of the Federation of Danzig and the RdDA was recognizable; However, the previous members of the RdDA and representation had in their meetings, u. a. of September 30, 2005 determined that the organizational changes did not change the essential content of the task. This was u. a. on October 29, 1999 and on September 2, 2011, summarized in declarations of the RdDA and adopted unanimously. The last and currently valid election regulations were again, this time substantially, changed in a council meeting on March 9, 2014 and redrafted to a direct procedure that was decoupled from the delegate election of the Federation of Danzigers.

Incorporation of the "Representation of the Free City of Danzig"

The former separate representation of the Free City of Danzig - Exile Representation of the Danzig State People , which had its seat in Lübeck , has been incorporated in the RdDA since 2005. Your previous tasks will from now on be completely carried out by the RdDA. The Representation of the Free City of Danzig saw itself as a Danzig government in exile . The first representative of the Free City of Danzig founded and elected in November 1947 shortly after the founding of the RdDA, by and from its group of people, consisted of the following people: President Nobert Sternfeld, Heinz Langguth, Hans Güldner, Joseph Cierocki , Hans-Carl Gspann, Hans Siedler and Herbert Leitreiter. On August 18, 1948, the Mission sent a memorandum to the Western Powers and the UN Secretary-General calling for the constitutional life of the Free City of Danzig to be restored under the protection of the UN in place of the dissolved League of Nations .

The agency has been awarding the "Culture Prize of the Representation of the Free City of Danzig" since 1962, currently endowed with 1000 euros .

Factions

Around the 1990s, through the emergence of individual people from the Gdańsk population or, in some cases, disconnection from the RdDA, further splinter groups were formed, claiming the successor to the Gdańsk government. Of these groups, which emerged as the government in exile of the Free State of Danzig in Frankfurt am Main or the Free State of Danzig in Exile ; Danzig-Committeé in Cloppenburg, so far no information about concrete founding dates, support votes or signatures are known or published. Not only the history of the organizations, but also the comparison of the publications of the RdDA (or earlier the representation of the Free City of Danzig), e.g. B. in the journals Unser Danzig , DOD or in the green papers mentioned from 1965 and 1994 with the images and written articles currently available online from new, self-appointed “governments in exile” such as B. on an Australian server, on Facebook , on free, advertising-financed groupware blog or private pages, enables both a comparison of their journalistic, historical and political nature as well as an opinion on the differences between the RdDA and these splinter groups. Regardless of these differences, the Federal Government replied on March 22, 2001 to a small question from Ulla Jelpke and the PDS parliamentary group regarding both the representation of the Free City of Danzig - the exile representation of the Danzig state people and the above-mentioned separate organizations that it was " what these organizations [...] have in common is that they demand the 'right to Gdansk and reparation for the injustice suffered by Poland' ". These previous splinter groups had so far at least a Gdańsk origin background. Since about 2011, other groups that feel legitimized for Gdansk have appeared (such as an alleged "government" of the "Free State of Free City of Danzig"), who, according to their internet presentations, represent an ideology about various, barely comprehensible claims. B. in the unauthorized assessment of taxes or the sale of ID cards, vehicle registration documents and license plates on their websites.

Statement by the Federal Government

In a small question to the federal government , the PDS parliamentary group accused the council of Gdansk historical revisionism in German-Polish history and demanded clarification about the knowledge of the federal government about the council. On April 27, 2000, the Federal Government replied that the Danziger Council's self-claim to be an “organ in exile” was misleading, that the Danziger Council was not organisationally aligned with the Danziger Association . V., the organization of the Gdansk displaced persons, is related - but there are personnel overlaps - and the Gdansk Federation is being promoted in individual projects. Regarding the continued existence of the Free City of Danzig under international law, which was claimed by the Council of Danzig, it was stated in the answer that “the ' Treaty on the Final Settlement in Relation to Germany ' of September 12, 1990 [...] according to the assessment of the powers involved, the question Another peace treaty settlement of the consequences of the Second World War [has] ".

The feature section of the Berliner Zeitung dealt with the problem of the Free City of Danzig and its state representative bodies in exile in Germany.

Web links

literature

  • Hans Viktor Böttcher: The Free City of Danzig: Ways and detours into the European future. Historical review, questions of constitutional and international law. Bonn, 2nd edition 1997, ISBN 3-88557-149-8 .

References and comments

  1. ↑ Danzig Calendar 1953 (PDF; 884 kB)
  2. ↑ Green Book 1965 of the Free City of Danzig in Exile (PDF; 6.90 MB)
  3. ↑ Green Paper 1994 of the Free City of Danzig in Exile (PDF; 6.78 MB)
  4. ^ Petition of September 2012 to the United Nations regarding the Free City of Gdansk. 09/13/2012. (PDF) In: goo.gl. September 13, 2012, accessed August 11, 2016 .
  5. ↑ Петиция сентября 2012 года при Организации Объединенных Наций относительно Вольново города Данцига. 09/13/2012. (PDF) In: goo.gl. September 13, 2012, Retrieved August 11, 2016 (Russian).
  6. ^ Petition of September 2012 to the United Nations concerning the Free City of Danzig. 09/13/2012. (PDF) In: goo.gl. September 13, 2012, accessed August 11, 2016 .
  7. ↑ See our Danzig 4/1951.
  8. ↑ See Böttcher, pp. 45 f., 71.
  9. ↑ Decision on the expansion of the composition of the Gdańsk Council from 5 to 7 people, dated March 3, 2013
  10. ↑ P # 20170304 PROTOCOL OF THE CONST. SESSION OF THE RDDA X. ( Memento of the original of October 10, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (March 4, 2017) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / ratderdanziger.info
  11. ↑ Election Regulations 1970 (PDF; 140kB)
  12. ↑ Election regulations 1980 (PDF; 140kB)
  13. ↑ Election regulations 1991 (PDF; 25kB)
  14. ↑ Electoral Regulations 1992 (PDF; 27kB)
  15. ↑ Election regulations of the RdDA from May 7, 2011 ( Memento of the original from January 12, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / minus.com
  16. ↑ Declaration of the RdDA from September 2, 2011 ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , in: Der Westpreusse - Unser Danzig 3/2012, p. 16. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / minus.com
  17. ↑ Election regulations 2014 ( Memento of the original from September 21, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 263kB) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.pdf-archive.com
  18. ↑ Circular for the members of the Bund der Danziger e. V., Lübeck, No. 1, November 1948.
  19. ↑ One of the self-proclaimed Gdansk “governments in exile”: http://www.danzigfreestate.org/
  20. ↑ One of the self-proclaimed Danziger “governments in exile”: http://de.groups.yahoo.com/group/DanzigerTafelrunde/
  21. ↑ One of the self-proclaimed “governments in exile” in Danzig: http://de.blog.360.yahoo.com/gerold_ewald  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / de.blog.360.yahoo.com  
  22. ↑ One of the self-proclaimed Gdansk “governments in exile”: Archived copy ( memento of the original from September 26, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.realhomepage.de
  23. ↑ Bundestag printed paper 14/5635 (PDF; 213 kB)
  24. ↑ See imprint "Free State of Danzig" ( Memento of the original from November 4, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / freistaat-danzig.com
  25. ↑ Answer of the Federal Government to the minor question by the MP Ulla Jelpke and the PDS parliamentary group - printed matter 14/3181 -, letter from the Federal Ministry of the Interior of April 26, 2000 ( printed matter 14/3263) (PDF; 54 kB)
  26. ↑ Volker Müller: Where is Danzig? , Berliner Zeitung, August 30, 2000, p. 11.