Pöördumine

AM BASSADE DE FRANCE EN ESTONIE L!bert6 Egalitt Fraternitt

N°

Taliinn, le 06/03/2026

Dear Minister,

The opening of the Patarei prison to the public is pianned for 2027, nearly 10 years after the Estonian government’s decision to create a museum in its stead. This memorial project, designed to condemn the crimes committed by totalitarian regimes, is of outmost importance. It is a weicome reminder of the task we must coiiectiveiy and constantiy uphoid : keeping aiive the memory of ali victims of terror.

Estabiishing a museum dedicated to the victims of the Soviet and Nazi regimes at the very piace where those regimes were operating is a strong symboi. Yet, the restrictive label « International Musuem for the Victims of Communism » has, to our knowiedge, been retained for this institution.

The future Museurn wili have a specific area dedicated to the victims of the Hoiocaust. The Patarei prison was the final arrival point of 300 of the Jewish deportees of Convoy 73, which ieft Drancy in France on

May 1 5th 1944 to Lithuania and Estonia. They iived in inhumane conditions, were forced to perform siave labor, and some of them were executed. Among them were Andr and Jean Jacob, father and brother of Simone Veil, first Chairwoman of the

European Pariiament (1979— 1982) and Ministerin France. Only 22 returned.

On this matter, it is therefore essential to bring action into words. The name of the Museum shouid reflect

its whoie history, and not oniy the eviis of the Soviet communist regime.

The Patarei prison has witnessed the most horrendous crimes from both the Soviet and Nazi regimes. Under those totaiitarian regimes, hundreds of thousands of innocent peopie were kiiied, executed,

imprisoned, tortured, and deported. To that extent, the history of the Patarei prison is not iimited to the

victims of communism, nor to the victims of nazis. it is a site of piural memory. Erasing this singuiarity and

dismissing the Jewish victims goes against the core purpose of the institution, which is to preserve the

duty of transmission, by heiping understand the inhuman nature of ali totailtarian regimes.

By asking you to relabel the Museum either as the International Museum for the Victims of Communism and Nazism or as The International Museum for the Victims of Totalitarian Regimes, we do not deny its portrayai of Soviet terror, we abide by a simple rule: the imperative need to preserve the traces of the victims of alI terrors. The singularity of each memory has to be showed, in order not to be denied.

We hope that the name of the institution wiii be reconsidered, in order to fuilfill the originai ambition of the

International Museum : transmitting memory, so that horror shali never occur again.

Justiits- ja DwirnnIs1rIUt

Ii 6. fl 2O3

N

Minister of Justice Liisa-Ly Pakosta

Copy: Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr Margus Tsahkna Director of the Estonian Institute of Historical Memory