Photos from the archives of a number of deported families were displayed at the National Museum of History of Moldova on the occasion of the 76th anniversary of the occupation of Bessarabia by the Red Army. “These are living memories for us, those who suffer,” Valentina Sturza, who heads the Association of Former Deportees and Political Detainees of Moldova, said in the exhibition, IPN reports.
The photos have been collected since 1988. “My father had worked in Azerbaijan, Baku, for six years. He returned to the country and ‘kidnapped’ my mother. He built a home, but envious persons sent him to gulags,” said professor Andrei Popa, one of those attending the exhibit.
Doctor of history Viorica Olaru said that this exhibition is the first of the series of events centering on the Soviet occupation and deportations that are to be staged in July.
Within the event, there was presented the second volume of “Memory Achieve”, which is coordinated by Elena Postica within the project “Recovery and historical employment of the memory of the victims of the totalitarian communist regime of the Moldovan SSR in 1940-1941 and 1944-1953”.
The event ended with the reciting of the poem “Pray” written by Florian Saioc by actor Sandu Ariston Cupcea.
It is estimated that several hundred thousand people were deported in 1940 – 1953.
