Association of Victims of Stalinism

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The Association of Victims of Stalinism / Community of Persecuted and Opponents of Communism ( VOS e.V. ) is an organization in the Federal Republic of Germany . According to the statutes, the registered association aims “to unite the opponents and victims of communism ”, advocates “the rights of the former politically persecuted or their survivors” and “prevents new paths to communism”, sees itself “as an opponent of Communism ”and calls for“ an examination of the SED dictatorship ”.

history

The Association of Victims of Stalinism e. V. was founded on February 9, 1950 by former inmates of the Sachsenhausen special camp in West Berlin . By the mid-1950s, the number of members rose to over 3,000 people. With the adoption of the Prisoner Assistance Act in 1955, the VOS achieved a "partial political success". State and district groups have been established since 1959. According to Petra Haustein , the VOS “became an important, if not the most important political force in the struggle for compensation and the lawyer for the release of political prisoners, who do not exist in the official jargon of the GDR.” The Ministry for All-German Issues received the VOS financial support. At least in its early years, the VOS is said to have had close ties to the British secret service.

From its establishment until the Peaceful Revolution of 1989/90, the VOS was monitored by the GDR Ministry for State Security (MfS). The activities of the association were monitored, and informants were infiltrated several times.

After the wall was erected, the headquarters were relocated to Bonn , and since July 1998 the headquarters of the organization has been back in Berlin. Until the end of 2009, the federal office was in the Deutschlandhaus , and since then has been in the immediate vicinity of the Zoologischer Garten train station.

After the Peaceful Revolution in the GDR, many new members joined the VOS. On May 26, 1990, the first East German association of the VOS was founded in Gotha . A little later there were internal disputes and splits. Since 2003 the structure of the association has been strengthened again. In November 2006, Federal Chairman Bernd Stichler resigned from office after calling Jews and Muslims "occupying powers".

In 1992, as part of the amendment of the State Treaty on Broadcasting in the United Germany , the VOS was granted the right to send a person to the ZDF television council as a "state-independent" representative .

Alongside other victims' associations, the VOS campaigned for the introduction of an honorary pension for victims of the GDR regime in the 1990s . After the implementation of a corresponding victim's pension in 2007, which only applies to the socially needy, in 2009 the then VOS chairman Hugo Diederich spoke out in favor of stricter tests to prevent criminals from being entitled to such payments.

In addition, the VOS campaigns for compensation for GDR forced laborers .

In 2008, the VOS protested against the support of the historical revisionist society for the protection of civil rights and human dignity by the Lichtenberg district office and city councilor Katrin Framke (Die Linke).

The VOS was a member of the Union of Victims' Associations of Communist Tyranny (UOKG) from 1998 to 2008 and again since 2014 . The VOS is the publisher of the magazine Freiheitsglocke , which appears monthly.

In 2011, the Berlin public prosecutor's office started investigations against the then board of the VOS on suspicion of misappropriating funds. After public criticism and a recommendation by the Berlin data protection officer , the Berlin state commissioner for Stasi records stopped funding the association in 2013. According to information from the Berliner Kurier , the association is said to have employed public officials as "advisors" without paying social contributions. Thereupon founded Vera Lengsfeld , Edda Schönherz and Mario Röllig an independent state association Berlin-Brandenburg.

On April 12, 2014, Rainer Wagner , who was also chairman of the UOKG at that time, was elected chairman of the VOS. On April 22, 2015, he resigned from all offices. Media reports saw - similar to the resignation of his predecessor - a connection with a racist speech by Wagner that had become public. Wagner had previously given interviews to the new right-wing weekly newspaper Junge Freiheit . In 2017 Detlef Chilla was federal chairman. The two deputies in the executive board of the VOS, May-Britt Krüger and Rainer Buchwald , currently lead the association.

In 2019 Matthias Katzen headed the Thuringian regional group of the association. He was the former Erfurt AfD direct candidate for the 2019 state election , but left the AfD shortly after the election.

literature

  • Jörg Siegmund: Victims without a lobby? Goals, structures and working methods of the associations of the victims of GDR injustice , Berliner Wissenschafts-Verlag GmbH, Berlin 2002, ISBN 978-3830503248

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ vos - membership. Retrieved September 4, 2018 .
  2. ^ Statutes of the VOS eV , PDF document, accessed on February 9, 2020
  3. ^ A b Petra Haustein: History in Dissent: the disputes about the Sachsenhausen memorial after the end of the GDR. Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2006, p. 259
  4. ↑ Bernd Adolph: The beginnings of the research advisory board for questions of the reunification of Germany from 1952 - 1954. Master's thesis at the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität zu Bonn, p. 21, footnote 64
  5. ↑ Michael Kubina: About Utopia, Resistance and the Cold War: the untimely life of the Berlin councilor communist Alfred Weiland (1906–1978). Hamburg 2001, p. 458
  6. ↑ a b Stefan Berg, John Goetz: " The man who embarrasses Berlin ". In: Spiegel Online. Retrieved March 26, 2014 .
  7. ↑ Inga Hoff: Radio after the turning point: The integration of East Germany after reunification by the Second German Television, the Deutschlandradio and the Deutsche Welle. P. 114f
  8. ↑ Uwe Müller: GDR past: Stasi victim pension now also for a manslaughter in "Die Welt" from February 23, 2009 [1]
  9. ^ GDR forced laborers indict Quelle and the steel company Klöckner , Focus , May 5, 2012
  10. ↑ Federal Agency for Civic Education: DA 10/2011 - Jesse: Facts and findings, no myths and legends. Retrieved September 4, 2018 .
  11. ↑ Ingo Rößling: Lichtenberg: Information boards are now around the Stasi restricted area . In: THE WORLD . April 19, 2008 ( welt.de [accessed September 4, 2018]).
  12. ↑ Press release: Protest against the activities of the "Society for the Protection of Civil Rights and Human Dignity (GBM)" from April 3, 2008 ( Memento from July 30, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
  13. ^ Association of Victims Stalinism joins the umbrella organization of SED victims , press release, November 2014
  14. ^ ZDF surprised by an investigation against TV council member Hugo D. In: mein-suedhessen.de. February 8, 2013, accessed January 23, 2017 .
  15. ^ VOS: Berlin stops funding for Stalinism victims' association. In: mein-suedhessen.de. June 6, 2013, accessed January 23, 2017 .
  16. ↑ Marcus Böttcher: The facade is crumbling: Stasi victims in the tax trap. In: berliner-kurier.de. January 23, 2017. Retrieved January 23, 2017 .
  17. ↑ Spin-off. Lengsfeld founds new victims' association in Berliner Kurier on November 13, 2013
  18. ^ GDR history. Victims' associations demand participation in the staffing of the future commission of the Stasi records authority in Mitteldeutsche Zeitung on April 17, 2014
  19. ↑ Markus Decker: Union of Victims' Associations of Communist Tyranny: UOKG chairman Rainer Wagner falls over a racist speech. In: berliner-zeitung.de. January 23, 2017. Retrieved January 23, 2017 .
  20. ↑ https://www.vos-ev.de/app/download/5808293361/2017-07-19+Vereinsregister+Eintragung+Vorstand+%281%29.pdf ; accessed on March 3, 2020
  21. ↑ [2]