Newly promoted Andrews Government minister comes under fire for comments praising Joseph Stalin’s Red Army
Comments made by newly appointed State Government minister Danny Pearson praising communist dictator Joseph Stalin’s ruthless Red Army have outraged the state’s Ukrainian and Baltic communities.
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A newly appointed Andrews Government minister is under fire over insensitive comments praising the ruthless Red Army of Soviet communist dictator Joseph Stalin.
Victorian communities who suffered under communism are outraged that Local Government Minister Danny Pearson suggested that Red Army generals be memorialised among migrants who suffered persecution abroad.
Mr Pearson, who was elevated to the ministry last week after the sacking of disgraced minister Adem Somyurek, made the comments in state parliament in 2015 while debating a veterans’ bill.
Referring to a proposed persecution memorial in Melbourne by then Opposition Leader Matthew Guy, Mr Pearson said he was surprised that Mr Guy “did not talk about the great contribution the Red Army made in supporting Western liberal democracy by … destroying fascism”.
“We are all the beneficiaries of the great contribution the Red Army made (such as) Marshal Georgy Zhukov, who won the Order of Lenin … it is important that the contribution of the Red Army be acknowledged,” he said.
The USSR initially had a secret deal with Nazi Germany, which precipitated World War II when both dictatorships invaded Poland from either side.
The Soviet Union only joined the Western allies after the Nazis invaded it in 1941, and then forced brutal communism on many eastern and central European nations for nearly 50 years.
Mr Pearson told the Herald Sun yesterday: “These comments were made a few years ago, about the need to recognise the perspectives and contributions multicultural groups make to Victoria – something I continue to believe in.”
But Mr Guy, whose Ukrainian relatives suffered communist persecution, said Mr Pearson’s comments were disgusting and obscene.
“For this man to be promoted to the ministry shows how insensitive Labor is to the horrors of communism, and to the millions of people killed by communists, and whose families now live in Australia,” he said.
Association of Ukrainians in Victoria president Slawko Kohut said he was dumbfounded by the comments, especially as Melbourne’s main Ukrainian community centre is in Mr Pearson’s Essendon electorate.
“Millions of Ukrainians died in a famine engineered by Stalin in the 1930s, so the community is shocked and hurt that a member of parliament could be so naive that he’d want to put up a monument to the Red Army,” he said.
Last week, communities linked to the Baltic nations of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania commemorated the 79th anniversary of mass deportations of innocent people to Siberia by the Soviets.
Australian Lithuanian Community Association president Tony Cibiras said the Red Army’s occupation had devastated the Baltics.
“The unimaginable terror it inflicted on the populations in these territories is not to be forgotten,” he said.
State Liberal frontbencher Tim Smith said it was outrageous that Premier Daniel Andrews had appointed a Red Army sympathiser to his ministry.
“Imagine what would happen if he appointed a Nazi sympathiser,” he said.
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