Open Letter to Embassy of the Slovak Republic in Poland

Communist Party of Poland expresses a firm protest against the new anticommunist law in Slovak Republic that today comes into force.

The alteration to the Penal Code which allows to sentence anyone who “rejects recognition and justifies crimes committed by a regime based on communist ideology” to imprisonment from six months to three years is a manifestation of the violation of principles of democracy and freedom of speech. It is also a part of ideological offensive of the capitalists who try to bamboozle the people that communism means totalitarianism.

A tendency to criminalize an activity that refers to communism appears not only in Slovak Republic but also in other countries of the European Union. It manifests itself in the legal interdictions which are based on attempts to equate communism with fascism and Nazism. It is in no way related to an objective historical analysis. To the contrary, it is a manipulation of history to fit the needs of the ruling classes and elites who are afraid of the strengthening of political forces representing an alternative to capitalism. It is not an accident that the current drive to forbid promotion of communism is being carried out in a situation when the capitalist system is in a deep crisis and when continuous attacks on the conditions of life and work of all the workers are being pursuit.

Slovak experience is similar to the one we faced in Poland. A similar change in the Penal Code which forbids promoting “totalitarian symbolism” that was directed against communist and the revolutionary movement was introduced on 8.06.2010, but it was recently – 18.07 – considered as unlawful by the Polish Constitutional Tribunal.

We demand cancellation of the new, anti-democratic amendment to the Slovak Penal Code. We appeal to other organizations to condemn this repressive interdiction and to increase the pressure on the Slovak regime. We insist on the renouncement of political persecutions in other countries of the EU.

We express our solidarity with Slovakian communist, representatives of a movement which demonstrated its merits when fighting with fascism in this county and now it is pointing towards the only way out of the crisis situation – the solution which ensures dignity and free progress to all working people – towards socialism.

On behalf of the Communist Party of Poland

Beata Karoń - Vice chairman