How the Poles saved Europe from the Red Army a century ago Patrick van Schie In Western Europe it is perhaps one of the least known battles of the twentieth century, yet one of the most important turning points: the battle of Warsaw in August 1920. Unexpectedly, the young republic of Poland defeated […]
By Beata Bruggeman-Sękowska It is 1980. Not far from Zavidovo, Soviet Republic. Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev is driving recklessly from his dacha his black Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow, a gift from the Queen Elizabeth II and suddenly he is driving under a truck. His limousine gets demolished but he survives the accident. Not the only car […]
By Patrick van Schie In the Soviet Union, according to official communist doctrine, the dictatorship of the proletariat reigned. However, this dictatorship never actually existed, wrote the dissident Moscow professor Michael Voslensky, who was well-acquainted with the ruling circles of the Soviet Union. The rule of communism certainly meant a dictatorship, but it was the […]
Beata Bruggeman-Sękowska In June 2026, I had the opportunity to visit a fascinating museum in Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, dedicated to the victims of Tsarist and Soviet rule. The State Museum of Memory of Victims of Repression offers a compelling insight into one of the most difficult chapters of the country’s modern history, preserving […]
Beata Bruggeman-Sekowska Every year, International Women’s Day is celebrated worldwide, often seen as a positive day for women’s rights and equality. For me and many others born under communism, however, March 8 carries a very different, somber meaning: a day shaped by propaganda rather than genuine emancipation. The origin of this day lies in the […]
On Friday evening, 6 March 2026, our vice-chairman, Patrick van Schie, delivered a lecture on women’s suffrage at the museum of the Maczek Memorial in Breda. This was part of the “Strijdbare vrouwen, weerbare democratie” (“Combative Women, Resilient Democracy”) activities that the Maczek Memorial is organizing in 2026 around International Women’s Day. Patrick van Schie […]
Patrick van Schie The story of a Soviet “dissident” during the Brezhnev and Andropov eras Book summary of Alexander Podrabinek, Between Prison and Freedom. Memoir of a Soviet Dissident (Indiana, 2025), 435 pp. On February 25, 1956, party leader Nikita Khrushchev denounced the widespread terror of his predecessor Joseph Stalin in a secret – but […]
Photo taken at Patarei Memorial Museum for Victims of Communism ©Beata Bruggeman-Sekowska By Beata Bruggeman-Sekowska The Estonian people fought for their independence from the Russian Empire between 1917 and 1920. Following the turmoil of World War I and the collapse of the Russian Empire, Estonia declared its independence on February 23, 1918, in Pärnu, with the manifesto […]
Maczek Memorial, Breda | March 6 | 19:30 – 21:00 (free admission) Lecture by Patrick van Schie, Vice President of the European Institute on Communist Oppression (EIOCO) and co-author of the book ‘The Liberal Struggle for Women’s Suffrage’. The foreword and introduction of the lecture will be given by Beata Bruggeman-Sekowska, Chair of the European […]
Beata Bruggeman-Sekowska Stanisława Falkus and Leopolda Ludwig belonged to the Congregation of the Sisters of the Divine Savior (Salvatorians). On 27 January 1945, they were murdered in a chapel by soldiers of the Red Army after having been sexually assaulted. Their beatification process is currently ongoing. Sister Leopolda Gertruda Ludwig SDS Leopolda Gertruda Ludwig was […]
On December 10th, the board of the European Institute on Communist Oppression and the Central and Eastern Europe Center (www.communications-unlimited.nl) held a very fruitful meeting with the board of the Maczek Memorial (https://www.maczekmemorialbreda.nl/over-ons) to discuss possibilities for further cooperation. The Maczek Memorial Breda aims, on one hand, to honor the Polish liberators for the sacrifices […]
by Patrick van Schie This year saw the publication of the second book by Lea Ypi, the Albanian author who previously wrote Free, a work about life in Albania as seen through her childhood eyes. Her new book, Indignity: A Life Reimagined, is a novelized account of her search into the life of her paternal […]
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