Today marks 85 years since that dreadful summer day when innocent people of Latvia were driven from their homes and taken away. On this day, repressions were also carried out against Latvian Army soldiers in Gulbene, Litene and elsewhere across Latvia. Several hundred Latvian Army officers were arrested and deported to Siberia. Many of them were shot on the spot. On 14 June 1941, Latvia’s towns and villages grew emptier and darker, Latvian songs fell silent, and the nation’s self-confidence was severely undermined.
The mass deportation was not merely the removal of people from their homes. Four out of every ten deportees perished in exile. Those who returned to Latvian territory did not return home, for their home was a free Latvia, not a Soviet prison. Their dreams had been destroyed, their families torn apart, and their ambitions and talents rendered meaningless. To the Soviet authorities, only one thing mattered: these people had been in Siberia and were therefore undesirable. They remained so until the early 1990s, when Latvia regained its independence.
Many survivors of the deportations were unable to speak of their experiences at all. It seems that this silence is the most harrowing testimony to communist terror. There are no words that can undo what happened. Yet those of us who have been given the privilege of living in a free and independent Latvia must devote all our energy to ensuring that Latvia remains forever free and strong. So that no one is ever forced to endure such horrors again in our own time.