The Eighth Tribe, 1981 (8. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1981-07-01 / 7. szám

Hungarian majority-block of the Carpathian Basin by military force, and thrown into minority status within a primitive Balkan country, Transylvanian Hungarians had to endure unprecedented discrimina­tion and injustice. The Hungarian-educated Rumani­an middle-class respected the ancient Hungarian cultural institutions of Transylvania and made no serious attempts to destroy the Hungarian cultural heritage of the subdued people. Evantually, due to German influence, the more nationalistic elements came into power, turning Rumania into a satellite of Hitler. During and after World War II more than two­­hundred-thousand Transylvanian1 Hungarians were killed, or died in the forced labor camps of Rumania. However, the tragedy of the native Hungarian1 popu­lation in Transylvania began with the rise of Cea­­usescu, the new Rumanian dictator. Ceausescu trans­formed the post-war Marxist regime into a national­­socialist (NAZI) dictatorship by declaring at the Ninth Communist Party Congress in' 1965: “Rumania is a uniform national state, its territory now occupied by one nation, which was formed by concrete his­torical events, and which resulted in the Rumanian Socialist Nation.” With this, the practice of government policy shifted from the Marxist-Leninist international socia­lism to national socialism, first introduced on this globe by Adolf Hitler, practiced later for a short time by Joseph Stalin. Thus, the nearly five-million non-Rumanian1 in­habitants of the new Socialist Republic of Rumania, among them three million Hungarians, were placed officially outside the law, outside the constitution, and beccame foreigners, outcasts, people without rights and without a future in their own homeland. LIST OF CRIMES Perpetrated by the Government of the Socialist Republic of Rumania. 1. According to statistics 547 clergymen, 489 Hun­garian educators, 49 Hungarian writers, poets, and artists along with more than 28,600 other Hungarian intellectuals were either executed, beaten to death, forced into suicide or died in Rumanian prisons, mental institutions or forced labor camps as a result of the government’s policy to eliminate the cultural leadership of the Hungarians in Transylvania and Moldavia. 2. All Hungarian cultural establishments and in­stitutions were either tom down or confiscated and Rumanized, including museums, archives, and libraries. 3. Hungarians were forced under strict penalty to hand over to the Rumanian authorities every picture, book, map. script, printed matter, private letter, artifact, etc., that could be found in their homes and was older than twenty years. Almost every night the Security Police performed a few “surprise raids” in the homes of unsuspecting Hungarians. They searched for hidden letters, books or anything else, and in the event they were unable to find anything they would “Plant” some old Hungarian newspaper or magazine in order to create a pretext for further harassment. Often those who were found “guilty” were beaten to death. 4. The use of the Hungarian language in public places, including streets was forbidden under penalty of beatings. 5. Hungarian schools were taken over step by step and Rumanized. The presence of two Rumanian students suffice to change the Language of education from Hungarian to Rumanian, while the presence of twenty-five Hungarian students are needed — without one single Rumanian — to keep the Language of a class of Hungarians for the next six months. Hungarian children are beaten for speaking their own language on any school grounds, while the few remaining Hun­garian teachers ere daily intimidated, arrested, tortured or sometimes beaten to death. 6. Young Hungarians are under constant pressure, being urged to deny their Hungarian heritage, change their name, and sever all contacts with their families. Those who refuse to do so are being discriminated against in every aspect of human existence, including job opportunity, hous­ing and food tickets. Those who refuse to change their Hungarian names and take a new Rumanian identity cannot participate in sports. The best example is the famous “Rumanian” gymnast, NAJDA KOMANECI, who is a Hungarian girl from Transylvania bom under the name of ANNA KEMENES, but in order to be allowed to com­pete had to change her name and deny her origin. Her trainer, Bela Karoly, is also a Hungarian, who just recently defected to the United States due to constant harassment because of his Hun­garian name. 7. Hungarian population of old Hungarian cities are being moved out of their home by entire blocks, and while being shipped away to distant corners of old Rumania, their homes are given to new Rumanian settlers in order to change the Hun­garian character of the cities. THE TRANSYLVANIAN QUARTERLY IV

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