The memory of the martyred heroes in communist prisons was evoked, on Tuesday, in the plenary session of the Chamber of Deputies by all parliamentary groups and unaffiliated deputies.

Social Democrat Adrian Solomon recalled that, on the night of May 14 to 15, 1948, the communist regime - which had just proclaimed the Republic and 'got rid of the king' - arrested 10,000 young people who appeared as legionnaires in the documents received by Ana Pauker from some leaders of the movement.

'These were young students, most of them, people who had not known Zelea Codreanu nor had they affiliated with the political terrorism of the interwar period, but only shared the Orthodox mysticism of the Legionary Movement, which had saved many of them in prison. But the detention regime martyred some, committing their lives in difficult and complicated conditions. In addition to all these saints of the prisons, there are thousands of Romanian peasants who opposed collectivization, there are hundreds of intellectuals or political leaders of greater or lesser importance who were part of the historical parties. (...) Like the deeds of those before the communist regime, namely the Nazi and fascist regimes, let us all say: 'Such things should never happen again!', the PSD deputy said.

AUR deputy Mihail Neamtu pointed out that Romania is the only Eastern European country that to this day does not have a museum dedicated to these great heroes, saints, and geniuses of the Romanian people.

'The only Eastern European country where such a culture of memory is not dedicated, to the last, to those who suffered is Romania. And Romania must turn its face to these teachers of freedom. Why did they die? (...) Why did Arsenie Boca, Nicolae Steinhardt, Dinu Pillat or Vladimir Ghika suffer? They all suffered because they believed in freedom and they believed even in the invincibility of the Romanian people in the face of an empire - the Soviet empire, which, unfortunately, today is metamorphosing into other empires. They protested against an occupation regime. They organized themselves to produce a genuine resistance. The only resistance in the mountains was the resistance made by these martyrs of the Romanian people, those who represent our country of yesterday and today. The geniuses, the saints and the heroes, the geniuses like Nicolae 'Margineanu or heroes like Gheorghe Bratianu show us what the vertical consciousness of a people means,' stressed Mihail Neamtu.

According to PNL deputy Andrei Daniel Gheorghe, when we talk about the martyrs in communist prisons, we are talking about one of the most shocking pages in the history of the Romanian people.

'Martyrdom in prisons, without a doubt, is a moment in which the Romanian nation has shown its strength to oppose evil, including when this involves self-denial, going to the point of martyrdom - a common model for Christian martyrs. (...) I believe that when we talk about martyrdom, we should all understand the essence of this sacrifice, which teaches us what freedom, democracy, dignity, patriotism and faith truly mean. I would like to evoke two great names of the National Liberal Party - Dinu Bratianu and Gheorghe Bratianu, martyrs in communist prisons, like Vladimir Ghika, Ion Pelivan, Ion Mihalache, Iuliu Maniu, Ion Flueras and other great leaders of the Great Union', the liberal stated.

USR deputy Ciprian-Doru Rigman recalled that, at the end of 1947, the Stalinist communist regime was established in Romania, with Gheorghe Gheorghiu Dej and Petru Groza as its leaders. Almost simultaneously, he added, the purge of exponents of interwar democracy, be they politicians or intellectuals, began.

'For the new communist regime, asking questions and seeking answers was no longer acceptable. Thus, exceptional personalities of our history ended up in communist prisons. (...) These people ended up in communist prisons because they valued dignity and democracy and did not let themselves be intimidated by force, fear and blackmail. We have a duty to honor the memory of these great personalities who ended up in communist prisons, but we also have a duty and even an obligation towards them: to never forget what an extremist regime meant in the history of Romania!,' Rigman conveyed.

UDMR deputy Markó Attila-Gábor highlighted that, at the time of the fall of the communist regime, he was 21 years old, so he experienced 'the horrors of that regime to the fullest', even if he did not suffer like those imprisoned under the Dej regime.

'As a child, my grandfather told me about the horrors of the 1950s, when the regime tried its best to eliminate individuality. And during that period (...) there were also many victims of Hungarian ethnicity. Among these victims, we can remember, first of all, Bishop Marton Aron, in whose honor we recently adopted a law declaring 2026 as the year of Marton Aron. (...) But the victims were not only personalities, but, first of all, from our point of view, education in the Hungarian language itself. Because after the 1956 Revolution in Budapest, the Romanian regime closed the Hungarian schools in Transylvania,' he said.

On behalf of the national minorities group, deputy Gheorghe Nacov, great-grandson of a peasant, pointed out that 'Romanianism can be viewed as a national tragedy, but, beyond the collective dimension of this national tragedy, the living memory of individual suffering remains.

'Every destiny broken in isolation, every conscience that refused compromise, and every sacrifice made in silence, far from the eyes of the world, out of love for country and faith. These people were not just victims of an oppressive regime. Through their resistance to attempts at dehumanization, they demonstrated that the free spirit cannot be shackled,' he pointed out.

They also evoked the sacrifice of the martyred heroes in communist prisons and paid tribute to them by deputies Călin Groza (UNIT), Mihai-Adrian Țiu (S.O.S. Romania), and Mariana Vârgă (unaffiliated).

The Day of Heroes Martyrs in Communist Prisons - a commemorative day on May 18, was established by Law No. 127/2017, promulgated on May 30, 2017 by President Klaus Iohannis.AGERPRES (RO - writing by: Catalina Matei, editing by: Florin Marin; EN - writing by: Catalin Cristian Trandafir)