Slovakia has apologised for anti-Jewish legislation passed by the country’s fascist regime during World War II which excluded Jews from virtually all aspects of economic and public life.
The Slovak government said in a statement that it “feels a moral obligation today to publicly express sorrow over the crimes committed by the past regime.”
The public apology coincides with the 80th anniversary of the “Jewish Code” based on Nazi Germany’s Nuremberg Laws. The parliament passed the law on September 9, 1941.
According the US State Department’s Justice for Uncompensated Survivors Today (JUST) Act Report, “wartime Slovak propaganda boasted that the Code was the strictest set of anti-Jewish laws in Europe.”
According to the JUST Act Report, an estimated 68,000 to 71,000 Slovak Jews were murdered during the Holocaust, comprising more than 80 percent of the pre-war Jewish population.
The government on Wednesday also opened a new exhibit on the Jewish Code in the capital Bratislava organized by the Interior Ministry. The exhibition is titled “Jewish Code – A Dark Story of History.
