Presidency of the Republic of Moldova
President Nicolae Timofti today participated in a ceremony on commemorating the victims of the Communist regime’s repressions, held on the square of the Chisinau-based railway station.
The head of state, accompanied by presidential advisers, laid flowers at the monument to the victims of the Stalinist deportations.
Attending the event were Parliament Speaker Igor Corman, Prime Minister Iurie Leanca, MPs, ministers, civil society representatives, survivors of deportations and their descendants.
The first wave of Stalinist deportations took place in Bessarabia and North Bucovina, annexed by the USSR on 28 June 1940, 73 years ago. On the night of 12 to 13 June 1941, Soviet authorities forcibly displaced over 25,000 people to Russia and Kazakhstan.
Historians estimated about 60,000 deportees in the wake of three waves of deportations in June 1941, July 1949 and April 1951.
