50 Years and Three Kilometres
Gaps in the Latvian Landscape of Memory
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
Only since independence have Latvians been able to articulate in public how they experienced the Second World War and the Nazi and Soviet occupations. Since then, numerous monuments to the victims of Soviet terror have been erected. Latvian participation in the Holocaust and the Soviet regime has gone largely unmentioned. The public debate shows that a lot of time and a differentiated appraisal of history will be needed in order to overcome the prejudices and heal the wounds created by war and other forms of violence. This appraisal is a precondition for reconciliation between the Latvian and the Russian-speaking populations.
(Osteuropa 6/2008, pp. 267–284)