Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft
The Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft (English: Sudeten German Homeland Association) is an organization representing Sudeten German expellees and refugees from the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia. Most of them were forcibly expelled and deported to western Allied occupation zones of Germany, which would later form West Germany, from their homelands inside Czechoslovakia during the expulsion of Germans after World War II.
The charter was signed in Stuttgart in 1950 and committed the organization to the renouncing of revenge and retaliation and promoting European accord. The organization tried to slow down the membership of today's Czech Republic in the European Union by demanding a complete revocation of the Beneš decrees which established the expulsion of Germans from Czechoslovakia after the war and declared them lawless.
The Landsmannschaft is currently based in Munich, Bavaria. Its chairman is Franz Pany. It is a member of the Federation of Expellees (Bund der Vertriebenen, BdV). Since Pentecost of 1950, the Landsmannschaft organized a traditional convention, the Sudetendeutscher Tag, which mostly took place in southern Germany. In 1950 the Homeland Association already vowed to reject any form of violence and revenge.
Critics say that the Landsmannschaft represents only a small part of the Sudeten Germans.
External links
- Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft, branch in Germany (German)
- Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft in Österreich, branch in Austria (German)
- SL New York / SL USA
- Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft in Argentina (German),(Spanish)
- Sudetendeutscher-Tag.de (German)
- Sudetendeutschen Jugend, youth organization in Germany (German)
- Sudetendeutschen Jugend Österreichs, youth organization in Austria (German)
- Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft, Landesgruppe Bayern (German)