(english / italiano)
Usare le parole giuste nella Giornata della Memoria
1) Marco Rovelli, Moni Ovadia, Idea Rom Onlus: Una parola giusta per lo sterminio dei Rom
2) Tatiana Sirbu: The Deportation of Roma to Transnistria
=== 1 ===
Sullo stesso argomento:
La memoria che verrà - di Jovica Jović
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Sterminio dei rom, cerchiamo un’altra parola
sabato 25 gennaio 2014
di Marco Rovelli e Moni Ovadia
per il Fatto Quotidiano
Il Giorno della Memoria è stato istituito nel giorno in cui 69 anni fa i soldati dell’Armata Rossa abbatterono i cancelli del lager di Auschwitz e vi entrarono rivelandone l’orrore. E sacrosanto è stato aver stabilito un giorno in cui ricordare quell’abisso incancellabile. Ma, come per ogni ritualizzazione, quella ferita sanguinante si scontra con il rischio della museificazione da una parte e della falsa coscienza dall’altra. Le attività e le manifestazioni di questa Giornata riguardano in maniera soverchiante la shoah, ovvero lo sterminio degli ebrei, al punto da oscurare quasi gli eccidi e le sofferenze subite dalle altre vittime della ferocia nazista: i rom, gli omosessuali, i menomati, gli antifascisti a vario titolo, i testimoni di Geova, gli slavi, i militari italiani che rifiutarono di servire il governo fantoccio di Salò. Ricordare l’unicità della shoah non può essere l’alibi per dimenticarsi degli altri. I rom, in particolare, sono stati per lunghissimo tempo misconosciuti nel loro status di vittime: e se oggi non c’è quasi un politico occidentale che non voglia mostrarsi amico degli ebrei e soprattutto degli israeliani, quasi nessuno di essi è disposto ad identificarsi con i rom. Nessuno dei rappresentanti politici dei paesi occidentali ha il coraggio di uscire da una visita al lager di Auschwitz dichiarando: “mi sento rom”; molti, però, si affrettano ad affermare: “mi sento israeliano”. Ora sia chiaro, nessuno vuole ignorare o sottovalutare lo specifico antisemita del nazifascismo e sminuire l’immane dimensione della Shoah. Ciò che è inaccettabile è il deliberato sottacere delle sofferenze dei rom e dei sinti anch’essi destinati al genocidio. È intollerabile che si discrimini fra le sofferenze di esseri umani che subirono la stessa tragica sorte. I rom sono vittime secolari dell’occultamente della loro identità e della loro memoria, oltre che essere vittime di un’antichissima persecuzione. Essi non hanno terra, non hanno un governo potente che parli per loro, sono tuttora gli “zingari” reietti: perché mai dunque riconoscere piena dignità alle loro inenarrabili sofferenze? La cultura orale dei rom, del resto, diversamente dalla cultura ebraica fondata sulla Scrittura, ha facilitato il compito della dimenticanza: non c’è stato che un soffio di vento, niente più che questo, nulla che sia conservato e degno di conservazione. Solo con fatica si è imposto il nome dello sterminio nazista dei rom: Porrajmos. Il merito di questo va al grande intellettuale rom inglese Ian Hancock, linguista e fra le altre cose rappresentante del popolo rom presso le Nazioni Unite. Il termine “Porrajmos”, nella lingua di alcuni romanì, “devastazione”. Ma la lingua romanes ha molte articolazioni, corrispondenti alla disseminazione dei suoi numerosissimi gruppi e sottogruppi: perciò capita che un significante abbia significati diversi per diversi rom. Da Jovica Jovic, grande fisarmonicista rom serbo, abbiamo appreso che quel termine, nel “suo” romanes, ha un significato sessuale osceno. Così per Jovica quel termine è inusabile, e offensivo: impossibile per lui ricordare i suoi zii morti ad Auschwitz con quel termine. Una vicenda paradossale, questa, direttamente legata alla dispersione e alla secolare marginalizzazione e inferiorizzazione dei rom. Per rispetto nei confronti dei rom come Jovica crediamo dunque che dovremmo cominciare a trovare un altro termine, che non sia l’ennesimo affronto alla memoria proprio là dove la memoria dovrebbe essere sacralizzata e conservata. Samudaripen è il termine alternativo che molti rom propongono: significa “tutti morti”, e non ha implicazioni imbarazzanti per nessuno. Domani le associazioni 21 luglio e Sucar Drom hanno organizzato un convegno a Roma intitolato proprio Samudaripen: può essere un buon inizio, per avere finalmente un nome, e un nome giusto, per l’Orrore dimenticato.
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Idea Rom Onlus
PORRAJMOS o SAMUDARIPEN
Il termine Porrajmos ha un significato controverso nelle numerose varianti della lingua Romanì. Alcuni rifiutano il termine Porrajmos a causa del significato della parola tra i Rom Kanjaira e, a sfumare, in altre comunità provenienti dai balcani. Ma fra le altre comunità Rom, anche provenienti dai balcani e coesistenti negli stessi territori dei Kanjaira, il significato si diversifica in tante direzioni: aprire, strappare, stuprare, divorare mostrano i denti, sbadiglio, abbagliamento, fissare, urlare, imbrogliare , piantare la tenda, lacerare, spalancare gli occhi o la bocca, forza smisurata e violenta, divorare, aprire gli occhi, aprire la bocca, apertura, seduta con le gambe sui fianchi, violentare, disturbare, ampliamento di un'apertura, libertà, accesso, allungare, allargare, estendere, fagocitare... Il termine è stato contestato a causa di alcuni possibili significati, in particolare per il suo uso come un eufemismo per "stupro". Ma questa ulteriore interpretazione , insieme a "gridare" e "bocca aperta" e "strappare a pezzi", aggiunge semplicemente forza al significato simbolico della parola, per quello che il genocidio ha fatto al nostro popolo. Ora abbiamo quattro parole diverse per l'Olocausto dei Rom, ma questo è abbastanza in linea con l'imprecisione complessiva sui Rom in generale, una vaghezza a cui noi stessi stiamo contribuendo. Tuttavia, il riconoscimento internazionale e l'uso della parola Porrajmos si sta diffondendo. Google ha oltre 80.000 voci di testo per Porrajmos / Porraimos / Porraimos / Poraimos e migliaia di immagini. La parola Porrajmos, per quanto controversa, ha dato un'identità e un nome al più tragico evento in tutta la nostra storia. Ovviamente non sappiamo se in futuro sarà ancora questa o un'altra parola a descriverlo ma, per il momento, crediamo che la priorità sia impegnarci per il riconoscimento, la memoria e la lezione di quei tragici eventi.
=== 2 ===
January 23, 2014
DEPORTATION OF ROMA TO TRANSNISTRIA
In the 40s all of sudden so called “Gypsy issue” was raised in Romania. It had nothing to do with the traditional attitude of Romanian authorities to this population. From the day of their liberation from slavery in the middle of the XIXth century up to the time when regime of Antonescu came to power Gypsies did not enjoy any special attention of any government. Thus, this “Gypsy issue” refers primarily to evolution of Romanian nationalism and modification of political order of Romania in the political context of 1940, and on the other hand this was an influence from the West, where back at the beginning of the 30s deportations to concentration camps began and severe repressive measures were applied as a result of deepening of racist prejudices, of so called “Gypsy issue”.
This situation began in 1929 with the enactment of a law stipulating certain limitations for Roma including freedom of movement of specially equipp
ed carts and caravans, forcing young people who have reached the age of 16 and are not working anywhere to work for two years in internment camps.
Later, when Hitler came to power in 1933 these measures became more stringent. In the country the main slogan of which was Arbeit macht frei (“Work makes a person free”), any person without documents could be announced a parasite. Therefore Roma, who could not confirm their German nationality were deported from the country. Soon concentration camps were opened and among their prisoners who were the enemies of the regime Jews and Roma were also kept there as criminals.
If real measures were taken against Gypsies in pre-war Hitlerite Germany, only some attempts of scientific analysis of relations between Romanians and national minorities were made at that time in Romania. This approach was based in biopolitics researches of other countries, especially of German science. Later this scientific area became an autonomous part of such subjects as biopolitics and eugenics. The basis for biopolitics was laid by Cluj professor Iulie Moldovan.
On the basis of this particular point of view the “Gypsy issues” was reviewed in Cluj Institute of Social Hygiene representatives of which are actually the “authors” of this notion. They are the authors of such notions as “ethnic purity”, “lower race”, “mixed ethnos”. They believed that there were national minorities in Romania that caused “bioethnic danger”, so called “minorities of non-European origin” or “ballast-minorities”, such as Gypsies, Jews and others.
With certain decisiveness it was stated that “the Gypsy issue” was completely resolved by the political regime proclaimed when general Ion Antonescu came to power, when Romania joined political and ideological orbit of Hitlerite Germany. Since then measures against people speaking different languages were transformed into the state policy.
Ion Antonescu was that very person who raised the issue on the measures against Gypsies at the sitting of the Government on February 7, 1941. After one inspection in Bucharest when he revealed gross violations of the way the city is disguised he required deportation of all Gypsies from the city. This was the beginning of the policy of Antonescu’s regime towards the Gypsies.
As Ion Antonescu declared at the court trial held in 1946 deportation of Gypsies to Transnistria was carried out at his personal order. It is worth mentioning that not a single order of Antonescu concerning Gypsies was signed by him or was officially published. These were oral instructions to the ministers and to the General Inspection of Gendarmerie. Antonescu was closely tracking how his orders were executed, so the policy towards the Gypsies carried out in Romania and Bessarabia during the war times can be considered as creativity of Antonescu himself.
As we have already mentioned the most important part of Antonescu’s policy towards the Gypsies was their deportation to Transnistria in summer and early autumn of 1942. 25 thousand Gypsies were deported to Transnistria, all nomadic Gypsies and some of settled Gypsies.
If we want to understand why Gypsies and Jews were deported to the territory between the Dniester and the Bug rivers which before its occupation by German and Romanian armies in 1941 was the Soviet territory, it should be mentioned that Adolph Hitler and Ion Antonescu exchanged letters and German-Romanian agreement was signed in Tighina on August 30, 1941 in conformity with which this territory fell under administration of Romania and the final status of the territory was to be decided after the war. Romanian administration of Transnistria headed by Gheorghe Alexeanu was dealing with economic and social life of this territory. This administration ruled until January 29, 1944 when it was changed by a military administration because of the developments at the front. Transnistria became the place where in 1941 and 1944 Romanian authorities were deporting Jews of Bessarabia and Bucovina, as well as the Gypsies living in the country.
We will speak about the Gypsies deported from Bessarabia to Transnistria. This issue has not been studied in a single special research. We shall make an attempt to tell about these events on the basis of archive materials and to complete the real picture of Bessarabian Roma deportation to Transnistria.
Basing on the analysis of these materials Roma deportation to Transnistria can be divided into several stages. During the first stage that lasted from June 1 to August 15, 1942 there were deported nomadic Gypsies and those who were causing difficulties. For instance, from June 1 to August 1, 1942 135 persons (4 tents) were deported from urban and rural territories of Chisinau inspection [6] and 33 person, including 19 women and 11 men from Balti region.
At the second stage (from September 12 until early October of 1942) settled Gypsies qualified as extremely dangerous and without any employment were deported. Deportation of settled Gypsies was going on in all Bessarabian inspections – Chisinau, Balti, Cahul, and Orhei.
During this period dangerous and unemployed Roma were deported. For instance, 51 persons – 14 women, 16 men and 21 children were deported from Cahul and Leova regions. We do not know whether there existed lists of the Gypsies dangerous for public order and unemployed Roma in other regions [2, file 552].
We only know about the records that were kept about the Gypsies who were in prisons at that moment, but these people were not deported as they could avoid deportation measures that had been carried out before.
But when they were freed from the prison and those who ran away during deportation were caught an authorization for their deportation to Transnistria was requested from the Main Department.
We believe it is important to mention that certain law enforcement bodies (gendarmerie and police) were intimidating other categories of Roma not subject to deportation to Transnistria with the aim of obtaining certain material benefits as a result of confiscation of the property owned by Roma. [1, file 121].
This can explain the fact that later the ministry and the Council of Ministers received a large number of complaints that many Gypsies were deported in violation of the established procedure and that the lists were not drawn up accurately and thoroughly. Later there was expected retrial of certain cases especially of the families of the Gypsies who were at the front. Implementation of these measures required additional transportation costs and authorities were very unhappy about that. [1, file 258].
From the same document we can find out that other complaints forwarded to the Ministry of Internal Affairs were simply not reviewed and general explanation was given that in each particular case deportation was carried out by mistake or at the request of the people being deported.
At certain stage the Ministry found itself in such situation when it had to return all the Roma and Jews back to their homes, as the latter managed to establish certain connections and demanded the right to be returned home.
In conformity with the order of Chisinau regional police inspectorate Nr. 20371 of September 3, 1942 wired to Balti local police it was necessary to select all local Roma. There were found 24 Roma men who hade previous convictions for various offences and crimes, others were deemed dangerous elements and persons without permanent employment as they were making their living by thefts and other types of fraud [3, file 596].
Thus, 51 persons (both men and women) with 63 children were gathered. Their deportation was organized by Balti Gendarmerie Inspection. On September 15, 1942 they were put into three railroad cars at Balti-Slobodzeia station for further transportation to Transnistria. Property of the deported people was confiscated and transferred to the Property Administration of Balti.
In accordance with the same wire order Nr. 20371 of September 3, 1942 to Ismail local police (Nr. 10371) Roma of this region were to be deported. 44 Gypsies dangerous for public order (16 families) were transferred to the gendarmerie legion on September 5, 1942 [4, file 61].
No instruction on finding and deportation of previously convicted Gypsies was made to this region. Therefore it was not specified what particular categories of Roma must be deported to Transnistria. In other words, assumption that the first category of Roma is dangerous for the public order is not justified, especially if we take into consideration that not only people with previous convictions were deported, but also innocent people, women and children.
List of Roma subject to deportation to Transnistria can serve as convincing example here. For instance, five families were deported from Chisinau region, 16 families (52 persons) from Cahul region, 1 family (2 persons) from police station in Chilia Noua [4, files 61-67].
During the third stage which began after October 13, 1942 (on this date the Council of Ministers made decision on refrain from new deportations) only few Roma were deported to Transnistria, primarily those who avoided summer deportation.
Settled Roma were deported three months later, except for several categories, such as mobilized both at front and at the enterprises executing orders for the front, invalids of war and their close relatives. As far as the mechanism of the orders execution, the information on deportation of nomadic Roma from capital can be considered the most precise one.
As we have already mentioned, some of the people deported at the second stage reached Transnistria because they were not aware of the ministerial order on their liberation from deportation. As a result in the course of the last months of 1942 and at he beginning of 1943 many Roma who found themselves in such situation and filed written solicitations were returning home.
At the same time many Roma who did not fall into the category of the persons subject to deportation, concealed their previous convictions either with the aim of joining their relatives, or believing that in Transnistria their situation could be better than at home. The Ministry of Internal Affairs set up three commissions that were reviewing their complaints in Transnistria, but each time the authors stated that they had written absolute truth. But since they did not provide any documents in confirmation of their declarations the General Gendarmerie Inspectorate required new field inspection.
In many cases the General Gendarmerie Inspectorate allowed servicemen to visit their families deported to Transnistria, covered their transportation expenses, but did not allow to return home for the simple reason that they allegedly did not request that. Solicitations of Roma were still reviewed by the authorized bodies until March 1943.
For example order Nr. 20771 of January 20, 1943 instructed that no deportations were to be carried out because of typhus epidemic in Transnistria. Later order Nr. 71265 of February 18, 1943 issued by the same department instructs that all solicitations to return from Transnistria shall not be reviewed.
Archive materials do not contain any information about deportation of Roma to Transnistria from such regions as Orhei, Soroca and Tighina. In this respect we have our own assumptions made on the basis of archive researches.
In several documents drawn up soon after the establishment of the Soviet power in this territory we have read that in the village of Cosuati, Soroca region, two pits of different sizes were discovered, the first one is 6 meters wide, 4 meters long and 3 meters deep and another one is 7 meters long, 9 meters wide and 3 meters deep. 20 skeletons were exhumed from the area of 1,28 m2 [5, fund 67]. At the depth of 3 meters 10-12 levels of corpses were laid. According to rough estimations 6000 persons were buried there.
Similar case was registered in the village of Straseni where there were discovered 11 graves 2 meters long and 1 meter wide, and next to them another grave 5 meters long and 4 meters wide. The latter grave obviously became the place of shooting of a large group of civilians. According to estimations about 350 persons were shot there. It is presumed that this happened in July, 1942 [5, fund 63].
We can assume that Roma were also among those victims and thus we can explain lack of lists of Roma of Soroca and Orhei regions subject to deportation to Transnistria.
Orders of the Ministry of Internal Affairs do not provide for clear reasons that caused Romanian authorities to deport Roma. It is supposed that the order on their deportation is based on the idea that major part of Roma caused danger for the public order, especially during civil defence trainings, when Roma were stealing and committing other offences causing damage to state and private property. We do not know the number of Roma deported during the first two stages, but we have information from many regions about people deported to Transnistria in September of 1942. However we cannot be sure that this information is accurate and final.
Thus, the policy carried out by Ion Antonescu set up the lowest status for this category of population and later led to extermination of large number of Roma.
Historian Billing differentiates various types of genocide, such as genocide by means of reproduction prevention and alienation from children, genocide by means of deportation, genocide by means of homicide [7, page 146].
It is worth mentioning that Ion Antonescu chose the second type of genocide by violating human rights proclaimed in the Constitution of 1923.
Therefore the fourth decade of the last century became terrible for a great number of Roma. In November of 1940 at the recommendation of the Ministry of Health Care because of typhus epidemic the Ministry of Internal Affairs prohibited movement of nomadic Roma. Next year results of secret census showed that 208 700 Roma lived in Romania, these were the people who were considered to infect “Romanian race”. In 1942 a Royal decree was issued defining theft tendencies and criteria for Roma deportation. That decree had tragic consequences for Romanian Gypsies.
Instead of conclusions we would like to note that because this drama was not thoroughly studied it is not possible to completely restore the events preceding Roma Holocaust and to systematize statistic data about deportation of Bessarabian Roma to Transnistria.
By Tatiana SIRBU,
Master of History.
Notes:
1. National Archive of the Republic of Moldova (NARM), fund 679, list 1, file 7239.
2. NARM, fund 680, list 1, file 4473.
3. NARM, fund 680, list 1, file 4570.
4. NARM, fund 680, list 1, file 4578.
5. NARM, fund 1026, list 2, file 18.
6. Arhivele Statului, Bucuresti, fond Inspectoratul General al Jandarmeriei, dos. 147/1942.
7. Myriam Novich, Genocid: de la Auschwitz la Bug, //Rromanothan. Studii despre romi, 1997, vol. 1, nr.2.
Later, when Hitler came to power in 1933 these measures became more stringent. In the country the main slogan of which was Arbeit macht frei (“Work makes a person free”), any person without documents could be announced a parasite. Therefore Roma, who could not confirm their German nationality were deported from the country. Soon concentration camps were opened and among their prisoners who were the enemies of the regime Jews and Roma were also kept there as criminals.
If real measures were taken against Gypsies in pre-war Hitlerite Germany, only some attempts of scientific analysis of relations between Romanians and national minorities were made at that time in Romania. This approach was based in biopolitics researches of other countries, especially of German science. Later this scientific area became an autonomous part of such subjects as biopolitics and eugenics. The basis for biopolitics was laid by Cluj professor Iulie Moldovan.
On the basis of this particular point of view the “Gypsy issues” was reviewed in Cluj Institute of Social Hygiene representatives of which are actually the “authors” of this notion. They are the authors of such notions as “ethnic purity”, “lower race”, “mixed ethnos”. They believed that there were national minorities in Romania that caused “bioethnic danger”, so called “minorities of non-European origin” or “ballast-minorities”, such as Gypsies, Jews and others.
With certain decisiveness it was stated that “the Gypsy issue” was completely resolved by the political regime proclaimed when general Ion Antonescu came to power, when Romania joined political and ideological orbit of Hitlerite Germany. Since then measures against people speaking different languages were transformed into the state policy.
Ion Antonescu was that very person who raised the issue on the measures against Gypsies at the sitting of the Government on February 7, 1941. After one inspection in Bucharest when he revealed gross violations of the way the city is disguised he required deportation of all Gypsies from the city. This was the beginning of the policy of Antonescu’s regime towards the Gypsies.
As Ion Antonescu declared at the court trial held in 1946 deportation of Gypsies to Transnistria was carried out at his personal order. It is worth mentioning that not a single order of Antonescu concerning Gypsies was signed by him or was officially published. These were oral instructions to the ministers and to the General Inspection of Gendarmerie. Antonescu was closely tracking how his orders were executed, so the policy towards the Gypsies carried out in Romania and Bessarabia during the war times can be considered as creativity of Antonescu himself.
As we have already mentioned the most important part of Antonescu’s policy towards the Gypsies was their deportation to Transnistria in summer and early autumn of 1942. 25 thousand Gypsies were deported to Transnistria, all nomadic Gypsies and some of settled Gypsies.
If we want to understand why Gypsies and Jews were deported to the territory between the Dniester and the Bug rivers which before its occupation by German and Romanian armies in 1941 was the Soviet territory, it should be mentioned that Adolph Hitler and Ion Antonescu exchanged letters and German-Romanian agreement was signed in Tighina on August 30, 1941 in conformity with which this territory fell under administration of Romania and the final status of the territory was to be decided after the war. Romanian administration of Transnistria headed by Gheorghe Alexeanu was dealing with economic and social life of this territory. This administration ruled until January 29, 1944 when it was changed by a military administration because of the developments at the front. Transnistria became the place where in 1941 and 1944 Romanian authorities were deporting Jews of Bessarabia and Bucovina, as well as the Gypsies living in the country.
We will speak about the Gypsies deported from Bessarabia to Transnistria. This issue has not been studied in a single special research. We shall make an attempt to tell about these events on the basis of archive materials and to complete the real picture of Bessarabian Roma deportation to Transnistria.
Basing on the analysis of these materials Roma deportation to Transnistria can be divided into several stages. During the first stage that lasted from June 1 to August 15, 1942 there were deported nomadic Gypsies and those who were causing difficulties. For instance, from June 1 to August 1, 1942 135 persons (4 tents) were deported from urban and rural territories of Chisinau inspection [6] and 33 person, including 19 women and 11 men from Balti region.
At the second stage (from September 12 until early October of 1942) settled Gypsies qualified as extremely dangerous and without any employment were deported. Deportation of settled Gypsies was going on in all Bessarabian inspections – Chisinau, Balti, Cahul, and Orhei.
During this period dangerous and unemployed Roma were deported. For instance, 51 persons – 14 women, 16 men and 21 children were deported from Cahul and Leova regions. We do not know whether there existed lists of the Gypsies dangerous for public order and unemployed Roma in other regions [2, file 552].
We only know about the records that were kept about the Gypsies who were in prisons at that moment, but these people were not deported as they could avoid deportation measures that had been carried out before.
But when they were freed from the prison and those who ran away during deportation were caught an authorization for their deportation to Transnistria was requested from the Main Department.
We believe it is important to mention that certain law enforcement bodies (gendarmerie and police) were intimidating other categories of Roma not subject to deportation to Transnistria with the aim of obtaining certain material benefits as a result of confiscation of the property owned by Roma. [1, file 121].
This can explain the fact that later the ministry and the Council of Ministers received a large number of complaints that many Gypsies were deported in violation of the established procedure and that the lists were not drawn up accurately and thoroughly. Later there was expected retrial of certain cases especially of the families of the Gypsies who were at the front. Implementation of these measures required additional transportation costs and authorities were very unhappy about that. [1, file 258].
From the same document we can find out that other complaints forwarded to the Ministry of Internal Affairs were simply not reviewed and general explanation was given that in each particular case deportation was carried out by mistake or at the request of the people being deported.
At certain stage the Ministry found itself in such situation when it had to return all the Roma and Jews back to their homes, as the latter managed to establish certain connections and demanded the right to be returned home.
In conformity with the order of Chisinau regional police inspectorate Nr. 20371 of September 3, 1942 wired to Balti local police it was necessary to select all local Roma. There were found 24 Roma men who hade previous convictions for various offences and crimes, others were deemed dangerous elements and persons without permanent employment as they were making their living by thefts and other types of fraud [3, file 596].
Thus, 51 persons (both men and women) with 63 children were gathered. Their deportation was organized by Balti Gendarmerie Inspection. On September 15, 1942 they were put into three railroad cars at Balti-Slobodzeia station for further transportation to Transnistria. Property of the deported people was confiscated and transferred to the Property Administration of Balti.
In accordance with the same wire order Nr. 20371 of September 3, 1942 to Ismail local police (Nr. 10371) Roma of this region were to be deported. 44 Gypsies dangerous for public order (16 families) were transferred to the gendarmerie legion on September 5, 1942 [4, file 61].
No instruction on finding and deportation of previously convicted Gypsies was made to this region. Therefore it was not specified what particular categories of Roma must be deported to Transnistria. In other words, assumption that the first category of Roma is dangerous for the public order is not justified, especially if we take into consideration that not only people with previous convictions were deported, but also innocent people, women and children.
List of Roma subject to deportation to Transnistria can serve as convincing example here. For instance, five families were deported from Chisinau region, 16 families (52 persons) from Cahul region, 1 family (2 persons) from police station in Chilia Noua [4, files 61-67].
During the third stage which began after October 13, 1942 (on this date the Council of Ministers made decision on refrain from new deportations) only few Roma were deported to Transnistria, primarily those who avoided summer deportation.
Settled Roma were deported three months later, except for several categories, such as mobilized both at front and at the enterprises executing orders for the front, invalids of war and their close relatives. As far as the mechanism of the orders execution, the information on deportation of nomadic Roma from capital can be considered the most precise one.
As we have already mentioned, some of the people deported at the second stage reached Transnistria because they were not aware of the ministerial order on their liberation from deportation. As a result in the course of the last months of 1942 and at he beginning of 1943 many Roma who found themselves in such situation and filed written solicitations were returning home.
At the same time many Roma who did not fall into the category of the persons subject to deportation, concealed their previous convictions either with the aim of joining their relatives, or believing that in Transnistria their situation could be better than at home. The Ministry of Internal Affairs set up three commissions that were reviewing their complaints in Transnistria, but each time the authors stated that they had written absolute truth. But since they did not provide any documents in confirmation of their declarations the General Gendarmerie Inspectorate required new field inspection.
In many cases the General Gendarmerie Inspectorate allowed servicemen to visit their families deported to Transnistria, covered their transportation expenses, but did not allow to return home for the simple reason that they allegedly did not request that. Solicitations of Roma were still reviewed by the authorized bodies until March 1943.
For example order Nr. 20771 of January 20, 1943 instructed that no deportations were to be carried out because of typhus epidemic in Transnistria. Later order Nr. 71265 of February 18, 1943 issued by the same department instructs that all solicitations to return from Transnistria shall not be reviewed.
Archive materials do not contain any information about deportation of Roma to Transnistria from such regions as Orhei, Soroca and Tighina. In this respect we have our own assumptions made on the basis of archive researches.
In several documents drawn up soon after the establishment of the Soviet power in this territory we have read that in the village of Cosuati, Soroca region, two pits of different sizes were discovered, the first one is 6 meters wide, 4 meters long and 3 meters deep and another one is 7 meters long, 9 meters wide and 3 meters deep. 20 skeletons were exhumed from the area of 1,28 m2 [5, fund 67]. At the depth of 3 meters 10-12 levels of corpses were laid. According to rough estimations 6000 persons were buried there.
Similar case was registered in the village of Straseni where there were discovered 11 graves 2 meters long and 1 meter wide, and next to them another grave 5 meters long and 4 meters wide. The latter grave obviously became the place of shooting of a large group of civilians. According to estimations about 350 persons were shot there. It is presumed that this happened in July, 1942 [5, fund 63].
We can assume that Roma were also among those victims and thus we can explain lack of lists of Roma of Soroca and Orhei regions subject to deportation to Transnistria.
Orders of the Ministry of Internal Affairs do not provide for clear reasons that caused Romanian authorities to deport Roma. It is supposed that the order on their deportation is based on the idea that major part of Roma caused danger for the public order, especially during civil defence trainings, when Roma were stealing and committing other offences causing damage to state and private property. We do not know the number of Roma deported during the first two stages, but we have information from many regions about people deported to Transnistria in September of 1942. However we cannot be sure that this information is accurate and final.
Thus, the policy carried out by Ion Antonescu set up the lowest status for this category of population and later led to extermination of large number of Roma.
Historian Billing differentiates various types of genocide, such as genocide by means of reproduction prevention and alienation from children, genocide by means of deportation, genocide by means of homicide [7, page 146].
It is worth mentioning that Ion Antonescu chose the second type of genocide by violating human rights proclaimed in the Constitution of 1923.
Therefore the fourth decade of the last century became terrible for a great number of Roma. In November of 1940 at the recommendation of the Ministry of Health Care because of typhus epidemic the Ministry of Internal Affairs prohibited movement of nomadic Roma. Next year results of secret census showed that 208 700 Roma lived in Romania, these were the people who were considered to infect “Romanian race”. In 1942 a Royal decree was issued defining theft tendencies and criteria for Roma deportation. That decree had tragic consequences for Romanian Gypsies.
Instead of conclusions we would like to note that because this drama was not thoroughly studied it is not possible to completely restore the events preceding Roma Holocaust and to systematize statistic data about deportation of Bessarabian Roma to Transnistria.
By Tatiana SIRBU,
Master of History.
Notes:
1. National Archive of the Republic of Moldova (NARM), fund 679, list 1, file 7239.
2. NARM, fund 680, list 1, file 4473.
3. NARM, fund 680, list 1, file 4570.
4. NARM, fund 680, list 1, file 4578.
5. NARM, fund 1026, list 2, file 18.
6. Arhivele Statului, Bucuresti, fond Inspectoratul General al Jandarmeriei, dos. 147/1942.
7. Myriam Novich, Genocid: de la Auschwitz la Bug, //Rromanothan. Studii despre romi, 1997, vol. 1, nr.2.