Olof Palme

Olof Palme was a Swedish Social Democratic politician. He was Prime Minister from 1969 to 1976 and from 1982 until his assassination in 1986.

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• Throughout history, people have lived in poverty and misery. They have been degraded by hunger and ignorance, they have tormented each other and been driven into war. Yet, not everything has remained the same: The difference is that we have acquired greater knowledge. The difference is, above all, that we are beginning to display a willingness to take responsibility for each other. Therefore, it is not without meaning when we react, take a stance and, to the best of our ability, try to influence human development.

• One should refer to things by their accurate designation. What is happening right now in Vietnam is a form of torture. What they do is tormenting people. They torment a nation in order to humiliate it, compel them to subjugate with brute force. That is why the bombings are an infamy. Of such there are many in modern history. They are often linked by name: Guernica, Oradour, Babij Jar, Katyn, Lidice, Sharpeville and Treblinka. In all those places violence was triumphant, but the judgment of history came down hard on those who were responsible. Now there is another name to add to the row: Hanoi, the Christmas of 1972.

• The rights of democracy are not reserved for a select group within society, they are the rights of all the people.

• Human beings will find a balanced situation when they do good things not because God says it, but because they feel like doing them.

• Apartheid cannot be reformed. It has to be eliminated.

• Apartheid is a unique form of evil. It is a form of tyranny that burn marks an individual from birth only because of the color of her skin. The fate of a child is determined at the very instant of conception.

• My generation is haunted by the images of the Jewish children in the ghettos and the concentration camps. The crimes committed against them caused us grief that haunts us through our lives. But for the very same raison d'être we feel outraged by the images of persecuted Palestinian children, and this time it is Israel that is responsible for the offenses.

• Werner [Swedish communist leader] is getting used to publicly denouncing the misdeeds of his fellow party members around the World. But he should perhaps start asking himself if it is not Leninism itself that is to blame. Parlament speech, 1980, on the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.