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Václav Havel Institute

08-23-2013

Conference on the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Totalitarianism - 2013

With the participation of political scientist Claudio Fantini, historian Ricardo López Göttig and journalist Daniel Muchnik, the Institute Vaclav Havel of CADAL organized at the Universidad del CEMA the Conference on the International Day in Remembrance of the Victims of Totalitarianism. This activity was sponsored by Club Político Argentino, Obvervatorio Hannah Arendt and the Czech Humanitarian Organization People in Need.

With the participation of political scientist Claudio Fantini, historian Ricardo López Göttig and journalist Daniel Muchnik, the Institute Vaclav Havel of CADAL organized at the Universidad del CEMA the Conference on the International Day in Remembrance of the Victims of Totalitarianism. This activity was sponsored by Club Político Argentino, Obvervatorio Hannah Arendt and the Czech Humanitarian Organization People in Need.

The Conference started with a presentation by Ricardo López Göttig about "The Historical Memory about the Totalitarianism". López Göttig is Doctor in History (PhD), Charles University in Prague. He is professor at Universidad ORT in Montevideo. Among his publications stand out: "Los fundadores de la República", "El debate parlamentario sobre la reforma electoral de 1902", " El Bicentenario y la evolución de las instituciones republicanas". His Doctoral thesis was about the civic forum and the fall of the non-political illusion, an interpretation about the process of transition to pluranism in Czech Republic between 1989 and 1991, and the rol of political parties in the open society. He is Academic Director and officer of CADAL in Uruguay.

Then, Claudio Fantini talked about "Past and present of totalitarianism". Fantini is journalist and political scientist. Columnist of the magazine Noticias, the newspapers La Voz del Interior (Córdoba), and El País (Montevideo). He leads a program of political analysis in Canal 12 in Córdoba and he collaborates in radio shows of Cadena 3 (Córdoba), Sarandi (Montevideo),and Radio Universidad del Litoral (Santa Fe). Professor and mentor of Political Sciences at Universidad Empresarial Siglo 21, Córdoba. Author of the books: Crónicas de Fin de Siglo, Dioses de la Guerra, Infalible y Absoluto, La Sombra del Fanatismo, El Componente Monárquico, and La Gravedad del Silencio.

Finally, Daniel Muchnik offered some reflections and led the questions to the speakers. Muchnik is journalist, writer and he has a Degree in History. He was professor at the Universities of Belgrano and Palermo. He is author of 18 books, among them; "Negocios son Negocios: Los empresarios que financiaron el ascenso de Hitler al poder (Edhasa)". He began his journalistic career in the magazines: Siete Días and Panorama Mensual. He served as Secretary of the weekly El Economista and also the newspaper La Nación. Between the 1976s and 1991s, he was sub-editor of the newspaper La Nación. Actually, he collaborates making handouts in newspapers, La Nación, El Cronista Comercial and Perfil. He received many awards, among them, the Konex Awards to Economic Journalism (1987), the Platinium Konex Award for Economic Analysis (2007), and the ADEPA Award for  Economic Journalism (1997).

Stalin, von Ribbentrop y Molotov firman pacto el 23 de Agosto de 1939
Stalin, von Ribbentrop y Molotov firman pacto de no agresión

The "The Black Ribbon Day" was adopted by the European Parliament and then followed by Canada. This initiative was proposed by Vaclav Havel and others European politicians and Human Rights activists in the Declaration of Prague about European awareness on Communism signed in June 3th, 2008. August 23 remembers the day in which the Molotov-Ribbentrop Agreement was signed, when the Soviet Union and the National Socialist German divided Eastern Europe among themselves. For the former President of the European Parliament, the polish Jerzy Buzek, this was "the collusion of the two worst forms of Totalitarianism in Humanitarian History".

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