IICCMER Director Muresan: Romanian gov't should be responsible for opening museum of communism

Director of the Institute for the Investigation of Communist Crimes and the Memory of the Romanian Exile (IICCMER) Alin Muresan says the Romanian government should take responsibility for the crimes and mistakes of the past and open a museum of communism in Bucharest according to Agerpres.

"At present, we can only speak of a former communist jail in Ramnicu Sarat, managed by IICCMER, where there is a memorialisation project, but awaiting funding right now. There are only public relations initiatives, so to say, words rather than something concrete. One way or another, it is clear that the Romanian government should do something, because it is the same state that did what it did against its own population, and then it is absolutely necessary that the government, not the private sector, open a museum of communism focusing on the crimes of that time. Even if the private initiatives are welcome, responsibility rests with the government," Muresan said on Monday.

He attended an international conference on totalitarian buildings in memory and conscience, organised by IICCMER and the Platform of European Memory and Conscience (EPMC), saying that besides sharing similar projects in the field, the event also aims to place the need for the establishment of a museum of communism in Bucharest on the public agenda.

The conference analysed the situation of the large totalitarian prisons, abandoned today in several European countries (Romania, Moldova, the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Germany) and the possibilities of preserving them as European sites of consciousness as part of a pan-European effort.