Ukraine’s parliament has made an important gesture towards Hungary by officially recognising and condemning crimes committed by the Soviet military administration in Transcarpathia between 1944 and 1946.
The Verkhovna Rada adopted the declaration unanimously, with 261 MPs voting in favour, with no votes against and no abstentions.
The resolution specifically recognises the mass repression suffered by the region’s Hungarian civilian population, including the notorious ‘malenky robot’, during which thousands of civilians were deported to labour camps in the Soviet Union, the Hungarian Democratic Alliance in Ukraine reported.
The decision comes at a particularly sensitive time in Hungarian-Ukrainian relations, as Hungary continues to block certain steps in Ukraine’s EU accession process and has repeatedly called on Kyiv to address the rights of the Hungarian minority in Transcarpathia.
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Ukraine officially condemns Soviet-era crimes
According to the declaration, following the withdrawal of Hungarian and German forces in autumn 1944, Transcarpathia immediately came under the control of the Soviet military administration.
With the involvement of the Soviet secret police organisations NKVD and SMERSH, the authorities carried out mass and unlawful arrests of civilian men aged between 18 and 50 under the pretext of mobilisation for labour camps.
The Ukrainian parliament states that thousands of peaceful residents of Transcarpathia were deported to the Gulag system without a court ruling. The declaration describes these actions as crimes committed by the communist totalitarian regime.
The ‘malenky robot’ is recognised as a crime
One of the most significant elements of the resolution is Ukraine’s official recognition of the repression of the region’s Hungarian civilian population.
The declaration specifically mentions the ‘malenky robot’, or ‘little work’, and recognises the mass repression of ethnic Hungarians between 1944 and 1946 as a crime committed by the communist totalitarian regime.
The document also condemns the repression suffered by Transcarpathia’s ethnic German population during the same period. The Ukrainian parliament says that, as a democratic state committed to the rule of law and opposed to all forms of totalitarianism, Ukraine has a moral duty to officially acknowledge these historical crimes.
Memorials and educational programmes planned
The declaration goes beyond simply acknowledging the historical events. Ukraine also considers it a moral obligation to honour the victims of Soviet repression in Transcarpathia, including through the installation of memorial plaques. The document also calls for scientific research and educational programmes concerning the persecution, while promising greater public access to relevant archival materials.
What was the ‘malenky robot’?
The term ‘malenky robot’, meaning ‘little work’, is widely used to describe the mass deportation of Hungarians and Germans from Transcarpathia by Soviet authorities after the Second World War. In autumn 1944, civilian men were often rounded up under the pretext of being taken away for short-term labour. Many, however, were subsequently deported to labour camps across the Soviet Union.
Large numbers never returned home. The new parliamentary declaration is therefore significant because the Ukrainian state has now formally recognised and condemned these events in an official parliamentary document.
Decision comes amid tensions over Ukraine’s EU accession
The Ukrainian parliament’s move comes as relations between Kyiv and Budapest remain strained. On Thursday, it emerged that Ukraine’s EU accession process was still facing obstacles because Hungary continues to block the screening reports linked to the second and third negotiating clusters.
The Hungarian government has repeatedly stated that it does not support Ukraine’s accelerated accession to the European Union and expects Kyiv to implement an agreement concerning the rights of the Hungarian minority in Transcarpathia.
Against this backdrop, the Ukrainian parliament’s decision can be seen as a significant political and symbolic gesture towards Budapest, even though it does not resolve all of the outstanding disputes between the two countries.
