The Hungarian Student, 1957 (1. évfolyam, 2-8. szám)
1957 / 5-6. szám
4 The Hungarian Student WORLD PROTESTS T he IMPRISONMENTS, deportations and executions in Hungary have roused the whole world to compassion and protest. An ever increasing number of newspapers urge world opinion—“Do not let the world relax its interest in the Hungarian cause.” We recently received the text of a protest from the Hungarian Students Organization in Norway which has been transmitted by the Norwegian Youth Association to the Hungarian and Soviet Governments. We express our gratitude to our Norwegian friends for their sympathy with our cause and for having been the first to raise their voices in behalf of our colleagues still in Hungary. We have sent proclamations to all student and youth organizations asking them to join us and thereby increase the weight of our protest. As a result several associations have transmitted similar messages to the Hungarian Government. The following is the text of the appeal from Norway: August 19, 1957 Dag Hammarskjoeld Secretary-General U.N. Building New York, New York Dear Sir: I address my desperate appeal to you on behalf of my 7,000 university colleagues who have found refuge among the free nations. The situation of our relatives and friends in Hungary is now quite intolerable, and we are helpless to assist them. The terror in our homeland has greatly increased. Receipt of our letters can now cause imprisonment of our loved ones, since the Kadar regime maintains a strict censorship of all our correspondence. I have just received the news that all my friends have been arrested within the last two weeks. The fathers and brothers of many of my fellow-students have had to face TO THE GOVERNMENT OF THE HUNGARIAN PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC THE undersigned Norwegian Youth organizations, tender our earnest petition to the Hungarian Government to the effect that it stop the atrocities which are being carried out in Hungary in the form of numerous executions and arrests. Under these tragic conditions, Norwegian youth feels solidarity with the youth of Hungary which suffers under these atrocities and violations of all the basic rights which were granted in the Declaration of the United Nations concerning human rights. We consider those rights as the basis of all human relations on both the national and international level. We consider it imperative that these human rights “be protected by law, and people be not constrained to revolt against tyrannical oppression, ultimately” as stated in the preface of the United Nations Declaration. Instead of securing these rights of the citizens guaranteed by law and legal organs, the lately established “People’s Courts” imprison and sentence to death young workers, peasants and intellectuals in Hungary. The “crime” of the imprisoned is to have demanded those rights which the Hungarian Government itself acknowledged to be the concern of every individual when it signed the UN Declaration. We protest on behalf of the Norwegian youth against these excesses, and ask the Hungarian authorities to stop executions and arrests and to set free those arrested. We urge the youth organizations of other countries to express their joint protest and to demand the immediate discontinuation of the death sentences and executions. We have also transmitted a copy of the present protest to the Government of the USSR. Oslo, August 1, 1957 Signed by: Arbeidernes Ungdomsfylkning (Youth Organization of the Labor Party) Unge Hoir os Lands for bund (Youth Organization of the Conservative Party) Unge Venstre (Youth Organization of the Liberal Party) Kristelig Folkepartis Ungdomsforbund (Youth Organization of the Christian People’s Party) Bygdefolkets Ungdomsfylkning (Confederation of the Agrarian Youth) Norges Ungdomslag (Norwegian National Youth Confederation) Norges By g doung domslag (Norwegian National Farmers’ Youth Association) similar persecution. We have a choking feeling in our throats, and we realize that now only you can help our countrymen. We ask you, dear Mr. Secretary, to bring to bear all the influence necessary in order to have the United Nations resolutions on Hungary carried out. We also ask you to visit Hungary personally in order to investigate conditions in the concentration camps in Recek, Kistarcsa and elsewhere, and to help thousands of innocent people to regain their liberty. We ask you to attempt, with all the means at your disposal, to stop deportations to the USSR and Red China and to bring an end to executions. We are certain that you will understand our utter despair and that you will help us to prevent the eradication of our people’s intellectuals. We trust in your help. With thanks, in advance, for your kindness, I am, Respectfully yours, President, AHS * * * August 21, 1957 United States National Student Association 10th Congress University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Michigan My dear friends: I am indeed very sorry for not being able to attend your convention. Therefore, I am sending you my warm and friendly greetings and sincere thanks for the asasistance which you have given to us, the Hungarian students in your country. In your work now and during the coming year, I wish you the best of luck, and may God be with you. I would like to make the following requests in the name of my fellow-students: 1. Protest to the Hungarian Government against the inhuman treatment of Hungarian youth; against jail sentences, deportations and executions. 2. Send your protest also to the Soviet Government, asking them to intervene with the Hungarian Government for the termination of such inhuman encroachments. 3. Support our plea to the United Nations that a committee headed by the Secretary General should be sent to Hungary to inspect the jails and concentration camps and to try to win freedom for these inoncent people at once. 4. Help us in our efforts to bring 150 Hungarian students from Yugoslav refugee camps to the United States. Please accept my sincere thanks for your support. Respectfully yours, President, AHS Appeal to Mr. Hammarskjoeld
