Dealing with the past
03 December 2011 News
This panel was moderated by Andrey Kovatchev, MEP, who in his opening address spoke of solving the problems of the past in Central and Eastern Europe and in the Arab region.
It is interesting to consider what of the European experience could be taken by Arab societies as applicable to them. He spoke of the Sakharov Award, given by the European Parliament for freedom of thought and for a decent future, and emphasised that five of the nominees for the award for 2011 were from the Middle East and North Africa. Kovachev dwelt briefly on the role of dissidents in Europe and Arab countries who have given impetus to the initiation of democratic changes.
Evtim Kostadinov, chairman of the Commission for Disclosing the Document and Announcing the Affiliation of Bulgarian Citizens to State Security and intelligence servicesof the Bulgarian People’s Army, explained how Bulgaria’s democratic authorities handled the disclosure of records of agents and informers of the political police. He spoke of the difficulties in the first 10 years of transition in Bulgaria in regard to outdated legislation and legal authorization for the process.
Joachim Foerster, of Germany’s Federal Commission for the Records of the State Security Service of the former German Democratic Republic, presented the experience of opening the archives of the former secret police of the GDR. Praising Stefan Komandarev’s film The World is Big and Salvation Lies Around the Corner, he also emphasised that without memory, without the truth about the past, there could be no future. Foester listed the problems that a democratic government in Germany had to solve in coming up with legislation on opening the secret police archives and meet the demands of civil society, while respecting the constitution. Patience will be key, because the changes will not happen quickly, and most importantly, to draw lessons from the past, he emphasised.
The long journey of transformation from totalitarianism to democracy in the former Czechoslovakia, was presented by Miroslav Lehky of the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes in the Czech Republic. He said that the process of dealing with the past involves three levels of change - administrative, political and legislative. Lehky described the key processes in this respect as being the opening and studying of the archives of former communist regimes and ensuring justice, not only as an act of justice, but also as an opportunity for society to identify and restore its democratic conscience.
Arab countries are now beginning their transitions to democracy. Most of them, as with Egypt, are still police states, Said Sadek, Professor of Political Sociology at the American University in Cairo, said in his speech. In our region, this transition proceeds through different stages, beginning with revolution, counter-revolution, to reach the beginnings of a new political system. For this reason, systems in Arab countries differ from those in Central and Eastern Europe and transitional justice is sometimes dangerous for citizens. It is imperative, said Professor Sadek, to restructure state institutions in Egypt, as well as the media, which are controlled by the government and secret services. Unfortunately, there is little political will for change, for which a civil society is needed.
In the ensuing discussion, participants discussed the diverse aspects of the experience, uniting around the idea that despite differences and national specifics, the ultimate goal shared by everyone is the building a free and democratic societies.