Jews will not be considered a national minority in liberated Czechoslovakia, it was announced here today by Hubert Ripka, Czechoslovakian simister of State, on the occasion of the ceremonial departure of President Benes for Czechoslovakia.
The special rights for national minorities which existed in Czechoslovakia before the outbreak of the war will be abolished. Ripka said in the course of a statement on his governments attitude towards the Jewish problem. This, he pointed out, will be applied even to the Jewish minority. “Jews will have full equality of rights with all citizens,” he declared.
Czechoslovakia, he continued, is prepared to accept new international protection of minorities after the war, but only if this system of protection is applied to all states, large as well as small.
Reiterating the Czechoslovakian Government’s sysmpathy for Zionism, the statement by Mr. Ripka said that emigration of Zionists from Czechoslovakia to “their own national state” will not be hindered. “Jews who do not desire to emigrate from Czechoslovakia will enjoy full and equal rights in the country, which is self-evident for any nation repudiating with disgust the barbarous Nazi racial doctrines,” it enphasized.
Mr. Ripka pledged that all anti-Jewish laws and regulations, which were introduced in Czechoslovakia after the Munich pact, will be abolished, and that acts based on those laws will be declared void. “While there will be certain modifications in the economic system, these will affect everyone, regardless of origin and race,” he added. Residents of Czechoslovakia who have taken an active part in persecuting the Jews and who exploited anti-Semitism for their personal advantage will be punished, the statement declared.
In explaining why the status of national minorities will be abolished, the statement says that “Hungarian and German minorities abused their minority rights, therefore members of national minerities will in the future be limited to equality as individuals.” This would not affect freedom of religion nor the cultural interests of the Jews, the statement pointed out.
“As regards Zionists,” it reads, “it follows from our fundamentally favourable attitude towards the national Zionist movement that its members, as in the past, will be able to leave for Palestine. The authorities will help in organizing the emigration plans.”
Referring to the scarcity of news with regard to the fate of the Jews liberated in Ruthenia and in Slovakia, the statement emphasises that technical difficulties and the dislocation of transport are preventing normal communication. “Our government will welcome the help of Jewish organizations abroad in easing the lot of the Jews in Czechoslovakia,” the statement concludes.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
