Madam Speaker, I rise today as chair of the Canada-Nordic-Baltic Parliamentary Friendship Group.
Eighty years ago, between June 14 and June 18, 1941, citizens of the Baltic republics of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania were forced at gunpoint and taken to communist prison camps. Many were elderly and nearly a quarter were children.
Thousands died on the way to Siberia and many more faced executions when they arrived. Forty-five thousand were only the first during what would become known as the June deportations. Tens of thousands more would follow. The horrific actions of the tyrannical Soviet government to assimilate the Baltic nations was unspeakably brutal, violent and merciless.
During those forced relocations, they silenced cultural and religious minorities and arrested, tortured or killed perceived threats to the regime. Let us stand with Baltic Canadians as we mark June 14 as a day of commemoration for all freedom-loving people.