National Victims of Communism Memorial | Completed

[J.OT13]

Communism, on paper, is not a completely terrible concept. Nowhere in the original visions of Communism did it say that a Communist nation must be led by a murderous dictator. Fascism the other hand, is based on hate and intolerance.

I'd argue that Cuba is an example of a somewhat successful implementation. Had the U.S. not condemned Castro's Cuba from the very start because he overturned the dictator that they had put in place (which is a common theme in U.S. foreign policy history), it might have turned out decently well.

I completely agree of course that the U.S.S.R.'s brand of Communism was an atrocity. Maybe that the monument should have been dedicated to victims of the Soviet Union.

That said, I don't believe in Communism myself. I prefer the brand of Socialisms as exists in Scandinavia.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by JayBuoy

as passwordisnt123 noted, the source material that they base their figure on has been widely discredited.

If you went out to calculate the number of deaths that resulted from capitalism using the same methods I'm sure the numbers would be extreme if every possible death that could conceivably be tied to capitalism were counted.


Also drawing an equivalence between fascism and communism is wrong. I don't see how communism can be as big a threat as fascism in this country. Especially since the state apparatus views communism as a threat because it aims to usurp state power, while fascism is not deemed as great a threat because its project involves entrenching state power and wielding it against particular groups.

First of all “they” are an American Foundation, not the proponents of this monument. If 95 million is a more accurate number it is still an enormous tragedy.

There are simply no capitalist equivalents of the Great Purge (about a million people killed), the Ukrainian famine (3,5 million seems like the most common number), the Great Leap Forward (up to 55 million deaths). There were no droughts or pathogens, the crop failures were purely ideological. A capitalist government is not going to start seizing capital from farmers, causing a mass famine that causes millions of deaths. That would go against the core ideology.

A “capitalist death” might be something like increased suicide during a downturn, or maybe industrial accidents caused by poor regulation but that would be measured in thousands, not millions (and I suspect industrial accidents were more common in communist countries).

[zzptichka]

Originally Posted by acottawa

First of all “they” are an American Foundation, not the proponents of this monument. If 95 million is a more accurate number it is still an enormous tragedy.

There are simply no capitalist equivalents of the Great Purge (about a million people killed), the Ukrainian famine (3,5 million seems like the most common number), the Great Leap Forward (up to 55 million deaths). There were no droughts or pathogens, the crop failures were purely ideological. A capitalist government is not going to start seizing capital from farmers, causing a mass famine that causes millions of deaths. That would go against the core ideology.

A “capitalist death” might be something like increased suicide during a downturn, or maybe industrial accidents caused by poor regulation but that would be measured in thousands, not millions (and I suspect industrial accidents were more common in communist countries).

Oh there have been plenty of militaristic authoritarian capitalist regimes that positioned themselves as anti-communist and that left millions of people dead. The one thing these regimes have in common is their totalitarian nature.

They should've really named it Memorial to Victims of Totalitarianism instead.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Communism, on paper, is not a completely terrible concept. Nowhere in the original visions of Communism did it say that a Communist nation must be led by a murderous dictator. Fascism the other hand, is based on hate and intolerance.

I'd argue that Cuba is an example of a somewhat successful implementation. Had the U.S. not condemned Castro's Cuba from the very start because he overturned the dictator that they had put in place (which is a common theme in U.S. foreign policy history), it might have turned out decently well.

I completely agree of course that the U.S.S.R.'s brand of Communism was an atrocity. Maybe that the monument should have been dedicated to victims of the Soviet Union.

That said, I don't believe in Communism myself. I prefer the brand of Socialisms as exists in Scandinavia.

Marxist ideology requires a “dictatorship of the proletariat” which forcefully seizes the means of production. This is what caused these huge famines. It wasn’t an aberration of communist theory, it was the direct implementation of communist theory.

The Soviets provided 63% of Cuba’s food after the Revolution, so there was no large scale famine.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by zzptichka

Oh there have been plenty of militaristic authoritarian capitalist regimes that positioned themselves as anti-communist and that left millions of people dead. The one thing these regimes have in common is their totalitarian nature.

They should've really named it Memorial to Victims of Totalitarianism instead.

I am ok with a totalitarian lens, although that will piss off the Russian bots even more.

These authoritarian regimes didn’t leave millions dead. Pinochet, who was a brutal dictator killed 3000 and left 1000 missing. Authoritarian capitalism is nasty, but it is nothing on the scale of totalitarian communism. The biggest death toll from a non Communist regime was Suharto in Indonesia, which killed 500k, although the New Order did not identify with capitalism and did not follow capitalist policies, so it would hard to identify those as “victims of capitalism.”

[Nowhere]

Communism is by definition a kind of anarchy, so there's therefore no such a thing as a communist government or a communist dictatorship:

"a society without class divisions or government, in which the production and distribution of goods would be based upon the principle “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”"

It simply happens that a lot of politicians, dictators and governments love to pretend to be things they aren't. The National Socialist Party of Germany wasn't socialist either.

Anyway, considering the state of the Canadian infrastructure, we should wasting money on monuments. Commemorative plaques can do the job.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by acottawa

First of all “they” are an American Foundation, not the proponents of this monument. If 95 million is a more accurate number it is still an enormous tragedy.

There are simply no capitalist equivalents of the Great Purge (about a million people killed), the Ukrainian famine (3,5 million seems like the most common number), the Great Leap Forward (up to 55 million deaths). There were no droughts or pathogens, the crop failures were purely ideological. A capitalist government is not going to start seizing capital from farmers, causing a mass famine that causes millions of deaths. That would go against the core ideology.

A “capitalist death” might be something like increased suicide during a downturn, or maybe industrial accidents caused by poor regulation but that would be measured in thousands, not millions (and I suspect industrial accidents were more common in communist countries).

Capitalism in its purest form also creates victims of anyone who cannot afford basics like food, housing, and healthcare. It's a system that makes a better life through higher education unattainable due to high costs and favoritism. It gives a massive head start to those born in money and keeps the rest down. In can ruin a relatively well off family in seconds if a health crisis occurs of if they get sued for something ridiculous.

The best system is something in between, that allows people to accumulate wealth in order to motivate contribution to society, but also provide a robust social safety net for those who need assistance.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by Nowhere

Communism is by definition a kind of anarchy, so there's therefore no such a thing as a communist government or a communist dictatorship:

"a society without class divisions or government, in which the production and distribution of goods would be based upon the principle “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”"

It simply happens that a lot of politicians, dictators and governments love to pretend to be things they aren't. The National Socialist Party of Germany wasn't socialist either.

Anyway, considering the state of the Canadian infrastructure, we should wasting money on monuments. Commemorative plaques can do the job.

Anarchy, the state withering away, is the final stage of communism, after the dictatorship of the proletariat (the stage that produces the 10s of millions of victims). The state withering away is pure magical thinking, like the rapture or the tooth fairy, and would never happen in any communist state because the dictatorship of the proletariat will never give up power.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Capitalism in its purest form also creates victims of anyone who cannot afford basics like food, housing, and healthcare. It's a system that makes a better life through higher education unattainable due to high costs and favoritism. It gives a massive head start to those born in money and keeps the rest down. In can ruin a relatively well off family in seconds if a health crisis occurs of if they get sued for something ridiculous.

The best system is something in between, that allows people to accumulate wealth in order to motivate contribution to society, but also provide a robust social safety net for those who need assistance.

Yes, pure forms of capitalism result in a lot of suffering. My point is that this is nothing on the scale of communism. You simply don’t get tens or hundreds of millions of deaths in capitalist systems.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by acottawa

Yes, pure forms of capitalism result in a lot of suffering. My point is that this is nothing on the scale of communism. You simply don’t get tens or hundreds of millions of deaths in capitalist systems.

We don't know that. There are no official stats that show the "victims of capitalism".

In Communist regimes, "Strong Men" dictators kill. Capitalism on the other kills people by design.

We could then talk about the U.S. killing innocent civilians in other countries when trying to impose their ideology, or by trying to kill a dictator they did not put in charge, or in some cases, a dictator they did put in charge but decided they no longer like. How many innocent people were killed by the U.S. imposing its dominance?

[Williamoforange]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

We don't know that. There are no official stats that show the "victims of capitalism".

In Communist regimes, "Strong Men" dictators kill. Capitalism on the other kills people by design.

We could then talk about the U.S. killing innocent civilians in other countries when trying to impose their ideology, or by trying to kill a dictator they did not put in charge, or in some cases, a dictator they did put in charge but decided they no longer like. How many innocent people were killed by the U.S. imposing its dominance?

This ignorance, dismissal and or denial of the lives lost to communism just lends creedence to why this Memorial should exist.

Here's a what aboutism back at you communist governments did those things as well on top of the massacres that acottawa and others have mentioned.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by Williamoforange

This ignorance, dismissal and or denial of the lives lost to communism just lends creedence to why this Memorial should exist.

Here's a what aboutism back at you communist governments did those things as well on top of the massacres that acottawa and others have mentioned.

I'm not denying that Communist regimes have committed atrocities and killed millions. I'm just saying that Capitalism isn't so innocent. People aren't killed directly by the governments, but instead by an uncaring system that puts dollars before people.

This monument should be against specific communist regimes and not against the idea of communism.

People need to get off their high horse and look in a mirror. It sickens me to see Americans think that they are the greatest country in the world when in reality, they are arguably the worse country in the western world. The shear hypocrisy and constant oxymorons (greatest country in the WORLD! but MAGA!!! - pro-life and don't play God, but support capital punishment and clone giant dears so Texans can play pow-pow, Kaepernick should be jailed for kneeling and "disrespecting the troops", but freedom of speech! don't "cancel culture", BLM should protest peacefully).

[JayBuoy]

Originally Posted by acottawa

First of all “they” are an American Foundation, not the proponents of this monument. If 95 million is a more accurate number it is still an enormous tragedy.

There are simply no capitalist equivalents of the Great Purge (about a million people killed), the Ukrainian famine (3,5 million seems like the most common number), the Great Leap Forward (up to 55 million deaths). There were no droughts or pathogens, the crop failures were purely ideological. A capitalist government is not going to start seizing capital from farmers, causing a mass famine that causes millions of deaths. That would go against the core ideology.

A “capitalist death” might be something like increased suicide during a downturn, or maybe industrial accidents caused by poor regulation but that would be measured in thousands, not millions (and I suspect industrial accidents were more common in communist countries).

Oh boy. You should learn about the Bengal Famine. A manufactured crisis by the government of Winston Churchill that killed 3 million Bengalese, by seizing farmers "capital" (agricultural products), and diverting them elsewhere. What of the poor houses, enclosure, or even the Irish potato famine (another manufactured crisis).

What about the countless wars/coups the United States has fought to overthrow democratically elected governments to install friendly (to the US) dictators?

I'm not saying communism as it existed in the 20th century didn't do bad things, just that the number they get at is so obviously skewed ideologically. The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation is run by the guy who started the heritage foundation and other far right think tanks and its outputs are largely apologia for capitalist/american crimes, or justification for severely draconian social policy.

Plus its just such a waste of space.

[JayBuoy]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

I'm not denying that Communist regimes have committed atrocities and killed millions. I'm just saying that Capitalism isn't so innocent. People aren't killed directly by the governments, but instead by an uncaring system that puts dollars before people.

This monument should be against specific communist regimes and not against the idea of communism.

But also capitalist countries have specifically committed atrocities. It's just that from the perspective of a capitalist society, those crimes are justified as being for the greater good and therefore not a crime. Wars fought by the United States against democratically elected leftist governments are always justified or forgotten in our history books, I mean there are so many I can't even list them all. How many bloodthirsty dictators were installed by the US just in Latin America so grocery stores could stock cheap bananas? Yet we can hardly contain our excitement to recount the crimes of Soviets or the Chinese. It's obviously lopsided. Are we going to count the nazis the allies killed in WW2 as victims of capitalism? No! it's preposterous.

Originally Posted by J.OT13

People need to get off their high horse and look in a mirror. It sickens me to see Americans think that they are the greatest country in the world when in reality, they are arguably the worse country in the western world. The shear hypocrisy and constant oxymorons (greatest country in the WORLD! but MAGA!!! - pro-life and don't play God, but support capital punishment and clone giant dears so Texans can play pow-pow, Kaepernick should be jailed for kneeling and "disrespecting the troops", but freedom of speech! don't "cancel culture", BLM should protest peacefully).

Empire in decline.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

We don't know that. There are no official stats that show the "victims of capitalism".

In Communist regimes, "Strong Men" dictators kill. Capitalism on the other kills people by design.

We could then talk about the U.S. killing innocent civilians in other countries when trying to impose their ideology, or by trying to kill a dictator they did not put in charge, or in some cases, a dictator they did put in charge but decided they no longer like. How many innocent people were killed by the U.S. imposing its dominance?

In communist regimes the state apparatus created by and controlled by communist parties implementing communist theory kills. There is no equivalent in capitalist systems. If there is the number is orders of magnitude smaller. The US and Canada suffered a major drought in the 30s. Hardly anyone actually died. The USSR suffered no drought in the 1930s and still managed to kill millions in a famine..

If you want to include “geopolitical” deaths then you would have to start adding tens of millions more to the communist toll, and it would still dwarf the capitalist toll. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan killed up to 2 million civilians in less then a decade. The number I have seen for the 20 year American involvement is 111k.

I know whataboutism is super trendy these days, but it just sounds nonsensical.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by JayBuoy

Oh boy. You should learn about the Bengal Famine. A manufactured crisis by the government of Winston Churchill that killed 3 million Bengalese, by seizing farmers "capital" (agricultural products), and diverting them elsewhere. What of the poor houses, enclosure, or even the Irish potato famine (another manufactured crisis).

What about the countless wars/coups the United States has fought to overthrow democratically elected governments to install friendly (to the US) dictators?

I'm not saying communism as it existed in the 20th century didn't do bad things, just that the number they get at is so obviously skewed ideologically. The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation is run by the guy who started the heritage foundation and other far right think tanks and its outputs are largely apologia for capitalist/american crimes, or justification for severely draconian social policy.

Plus its just such a waste of space.

I agree with you on the waste of space. That is a recurring problem with a number of monuments built in recent history.

Was the Bengal famine in any way related to capitalism? The British military’s policy of trying to deny the approaching Japanese Army food and boats was a horrible idea, but I don’t think it was related to capitalist ideology.

The Irish famine was probably made worse by capitalism, although there was also a massive crop failure caused by a pathogen. There is no equivalent for the communist famines.

The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation is not the proponent of this project. That is an American foundation.

[Admiral Nelson]

For the love of God this thing needs to be forced to live within its original budget. It's a frickin monument, and by singling out an utopian ideology (one that can be reasonably be distinguished from historical crimes done under its name), it smacks political at that. I resent that a dime of public money/land was earmarked for this.

Ten bucks says that eventually the oil & gas lobby will ask the feds to pitch in $millions for a statue of an oil and gas worker, victim of environmentalism

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by Admiral Nelson

For the love of God this thing needs to be forced to live within its original budget. It's a frickin monument, and by singling out an utopian ideology (one that can be reasonably be distinguished from historical crimes done under its name), it smacks political at that. I resent that a dime of public money/land was earmarked for this.

Ten bucks says that eventually the oil & gas lobby will ask the feds to pitch in $millions for a statue of an oil and gas worker, victim of environmentalism

There is no rational way to distinguish the “historical crimes” from the “utopian ideology.” Not only were the “historical crimes” committed in the name of the “utopian ideology” they were fairly closely implementing the well-documented theories of the ideology. Communist theory requires a violent revolution (killing millions). Communist theory requires a totalitarian dictatorship of the proletariat where the state violently seizes the means of production (killing tens of millions in famines) and suppresses political opponents (killing millions). Some of the historical crimes are probably optional (the Great Purge or the Cultural Revolution) but are a fairly predictable consequence of totalitarianism. Communism without the violence, totalitarianism and oppression would be liberal social democratic parties like the Labour Party before Tony Blair, which never identified with communism and rejected most elements of communist ideology.

[Admiral Nelson]

Originally Posted by acottawa

There is no rational way to distinguish the “historical crimes” from the “utopian ideology.” Not only were the “historical crimes” committed in the name of the “utopian ideology” they were fairly closely implementing the well-documented theories of the ideology. Communist theory requires a violent revolution (killing millions). Communist theory requires a totalitarian dictatorship of the proletariat where the state violently seizes the means of production (killing tens of millions in famines) and suppresses political opponents (killing millions). Some of the historical crimes are probably optional (the Great Purge or the Cultural Revolution) but are a fairly predictable consequence of totalitarianism. Communism without the violence, totalitarianism and oppression would be liberal social democratic parties like the Labour Party before Tony Blair, which never identified with communism and rejected most elements of communist ideology.

You must also think of all Catholics as murderous because of the Crusades. Or are they not burdened by the worst done in their name? Are communists required to burden the crimes of dictators that rose in the midst of revolution and seized power for themselves?

This is extra weird because there's a small fringe communist party in Canada. They probably style themselves as Castro-lite types. Or maybe they like the idea of the Star Trek future, or are inspired by the kibbutz concept in Israel, both seem pretty communistic. I don't agree with them, but that doesn't make them violent criminals. Seizing the means of production to them probably means nationalization, not bourgeois genocide. The fact that the proponents of this monument identify communism, moreso than totalitarianism, as the root of the evil, invites questioning of this group's commemorative motivation. Whether it was their intent or not, it smells like politics to me. Taxpayers should feel victimized here.

Next in line for the Garden of the Provinces and Territories, should we expect a "Memorial to the Victims of Germans", because they brought Nazi thugs into power two generations ago? Precision matters.

[J.OT13]

Victims of communism memorial received donations honouring fascists, Nazi collaborators, according to website

Fundraiser says the list of names to be included on the monument has not been finalized

Taylor C. Noakes · for CBC News · Posted: Jul 23, 2021 4:00 AM ET | Last Updated: 6 hours ago



A controversial monument being built in Ottawa to honour victims of communist regimes has received donations in honour of known fascists and Nazi collaborators, according to a list posted online by the organization spearheading the project.

The Memorial to the Victims of Communism is being financed partly through a "buy-a-brick" campaign called Pathways to Liberty, which is run by the registered charity Tribute to Liberty.

The campaign sells "virtual bricks" that appear on the organization's website and in their newsletter. The bricks are dedicated to alleged victims of communism and include biographical notes about the individuals being commemorated.

But some donors seem to be attempting to sanitize the records of known fascists and war criminals.

An organization calling itself the General Committee of United Croats of Canada purchased virtual bricks dedicated to Ante Pavelić, describing him only as a "doctor of laws."

Pavelić was the wartime leader of the Ustaša, the fascist organization that ran the Independent State of Croatia, a Nazi puppet regime. In this role, Pavelić was the chief perpetrator of the Holocaust in the Balkans. Approximately 32,000 Jews, 25,000 Roma and 330,000 Serbs were murdered by the regime.

The same organization purchased a brick dedicated to Mile Budak, whom they identified simply as a "poet". Budak was also a high-ranking Ustaša official.

References to Budak and Pavelić have been removed from the Tribute to Liberty website.

It's not clear whether the donations were returned; when asked, Ludwik Klimkowski, Tribute to Liberty's chair, said it would be "premature" to comment. Another Ustaša official, Ivan Oršanić, remains listed on the site.

An organization calling itself the Knightly Order of Vitéz purchased five bricks. "Several members of the order actively participated in the persecution, despoliation and, in 1944, the deportation of the Hungarian Jews," said László Karsai, a professor of history at the University of Szeged.


The winning design for the Memorial to the Victims of Communism was created by Toronto architect and artist Paul Raff. Its scale was drastically reduced from the original, which was supposed to be located near the Supreme Court of Canada before being moved across Wellington Street amid controversy. (Supplied)

Vitéz members included high-ranking members of the Nazi-puppet government established late in the war, which organized the deportation of some 437,000 Hungarian Jews. "It was the biggest, fastest deportation action of the Holocaust," said Karsai. "Several tens of thousands of Vitéz members got large lands (from) Jewish properties."

The League of Ukrainian Canadians' Edmonton Branch, meanwhile, purchased five virtual bricks in honour of Roman Shukhevych — who led the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) during the Second World War and was responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of Belarusians, Jews, Poles and Ukrainians.

Orest Steciw, executive director of the League of Ukrainian Canadians, told CBC News that while his organization did sponsor bricks for the monument, he cannot name the individuals to whom they were dedicated because he was not the executive director at the time.

"If Canada commemorates Ante Pavelić or Roman Shukhevych," said Efraim Zuroff, a noted Nazi-hunter and the director of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in Jerusalem, "it can throw its human rights record right in the trash."

'They remember what they want to remember'

The UPA was the armed wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists-Bandera faction (OUN-b). Per Anders Rudling, a historian at Lund University in Sweden who has written critically about Shukhevych, said devotees of this "Nazi collaborator" have been working to rehabilitate his image.

"While Shukhevych (and the OUN-b) were antisemitic and totalitarian, most of his admirers today are not," Rudling told CBC News. "They remember what they want to remember — a sanitized, whitewashed image of a heroic officer.

"Shukhevych was a Nazi collaborator and ethnic cleanser. The units under his command massacred Jews and Poles.

"A monument to the victims of communism is fair and legitimate. Millions of people were murdered by Stalin and Mao, and there is a case to be made for their commemoration. It is peculiar, however, that people who committed genocide are being glorified along with those legitimate victims."

Klimkowski wouldn't comment on the specific names listed on the charity's website.

He said that questions about the individuals being commemorated "are premature" since Tribute to Liberty and the Department of Canadian Heritage are still reviewing the final list of names to be included on the memorial itself. Klimkowski said that process should be finished by December of this year.

Canadian Heritage, meanwhile, said that it's reviewing the list of names proposed for the monument itself — not the names listed on the charity's website.

A troubled project

The Victims of Communism memorial project has been beset by problems. The project originally was supposed to cost $1.5 million, to be drawn exclusively from private donations, but the amount of money raised in the early years of the project was so low it barely covered Tribute to Liberty's operating expenses.

In 2013, the Harper government pledged $1.5 million to the project, a figure that increased to $3 million by 2014. By the end of 2014, the project's budget had ballooned to $5.5 million, with a taxpayer contribution of $4.3 million.

The Royal Architectural Institute of Canada initiated a court challenge of the project, arguing that the National Capital Commission (NCC) violated its own procedures on public consultation and the rules set out in the National Capital Act. A poll from the spring of 2015 found that a majority of Canadians — including nearly two-thirds of self-identified conservatives — opposed the initial project.

A NCC spokesperson said the estimated total cost of the monument is now $7.5 million, with $6 million coming from the federal government after Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland included an additional $4 million in this spring's budget to complete the monument.

High-level political support

The monument has received letters of support from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, former Green party leader Elizabeth May, former NDP leader Tom Mulcair and former federal justice minister Irwin Cotler.

Former prime minister Stephen Harper purchased several commemorative bricks, as did Alberta Premier Jason Kenney, who was the project's champion while in Harper's cabinet. Sen. Linda Frum is listed on the monument's donors page as a legacy donor, having committed over $100,000.

Initially, the Wall of Remembrance was supposed to feature the names of 1,000 victims of communism, but by the end of 2015 a list of only 300 or so names had been compiled. The department said it is now looking at a list of 600 names for possible inclusion in the memorial.

Canadian Heritage hired Carleton University historian Michael Petrou to review those 600 names, but not the names listed on Tribute to Liberty's website or in its newsletters. Petrou told CBC News there is overlap between the list of names for the monument and the list on the website.

Identifying the collaborators

Petrou filed his report to the department back in the spring. He said he red-flagged the names of individuals in that list of 600 who collaborated with the Nazis or were associated with fascist organizations that were active in Eastern Europe and the Balkans during the Second World War.

Petrou said he also flagged names of individuals who could not reasonably be described as "victims of communism."

The Pathways to Liberty list seems to embrace a very broad definition of "victims of communism" that extends to other apparent victims of political violence and veterans of Cold War era conflicts.

The list on the website also includes people who don't seem to be victims of persecution by communist regimes — such as Tara Singh Hayer, a Sikh journalist and activist assassinated in Vancouver in 1998, and Jagat S. Uppal, a successful B.C. businessman who was one of the first Sikhs to attend public school in Vancouver.


The initial proposal called for the memorial to victims of international communism to be constructed near the Supreme Court of Canada.

Tribute to Liberty's website and newsletter say that the Pathways to Liberty project features stories about victims of communism, while the Wall of Remembrance will display the names of victims and survivors of communist regimes.

"... Visitors will see names ranging from donors' own names or those of their ancestors to the names of historical figures and events that are important to these donors," says a statement from Canadian Heritage, which declined a request for an interview. "These names will be linked to a planned website to be developed and hosted by Tribute to Liberty that will share the stories of these individuals, groups and events."

Donations to monument closed now, says treasurer

The Tribute to Liberty website indicates that it is still seeking $1,000 donations in exchange for official commemoration on the wall itself and on the website. A link on the charity's website labelled 'donate today' leads to PayPal and an auto-loaded $1,000 donation.

But Tribute to Liberty's treasurer Alide Forstmanis said donations to the wall are no longer being accepted and the organization is only accepting $200 donations for virtual bricks now.

Klimkowski said in an email that Tribute to Liberty's fundraising was finished by the end of 2017 and that all the necessary funding was forwarded to the NCC, which is overseeing construction of the monument. A spokesperson for the NCC indicated that Tribute to Liberty sent $1 million in 2017 and another $500,000 in 2018, and has not transferred any additional funds.

'A broader effort to distort the history of the Holocaust'

Zuroff said he's alarmed by efforts to present wartime Nazi collaborators as anti-Communist patriots.

"From the beginning of their renewed independence, following the breakup of the Soviet Union, almost all the governments of Eastern Europe — and nationalist elements in diaspora communities — have promoted the canard of equivalency between the crimes of the Third Reich and those of Communism as part of a broader effort to distort the history of the Holocaust and the Second World War," he said.

Some war memorials in Canada have inspired controversy over their ties to wartime collaborators. A cenotaph dedicated to the veterans of the Waffen-SS 'Galicia Division' in an Oakville cemetery made headlines last year when Halton Region police opened a hate crimes investigation after the monument was defaced.

A bust of Roman Shukhevych outside the Ukrainian Youth Unity Complex in Edmonton was tagged with the words ''Nazi scum" in late 2019. Because it was suggested that the act may have been motivated by hatred toward an identifiable group, the Hate Crime and Violent Extremism Unit of the Edmonton Police was tasked with investigating, although it ultimately concluded the vandalism didn't meet the standard of a hate crime.

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https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/victims-communism-memorial-fascists-1.6112809