B’nai B’rith International condemns the National Bank of Romania’s plans to distribute a commemorative coin in honor of Prime Minister and Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church Miron Cristea. B’nai B’rith International Executive Vice President Daniel S. Mariaschin co-signed a letter with Rabbi Andrew Baker, American Jewish Committee’s director of International Jewish Affairs, to the leaders of the National Bank of Romania in which they note: “You are honoring the prime minister of a totalitarian regime who persecuted the Jews through denaturalization and anti-Semitic incitements.”

Both Mariaschin and Baker were members of the International Commission on the Holocaust in Romania.

As World War II loomed, Cristea called for the expulsion of Jews from Romania and stripped some 225,000 Romanian Jews of their citizenship.

The letter also points out that this coin will fuel the efforts of Holocaust deniers in Romania and elsewhere.

“Your actions are in clear contradiction not only with the Final Report of the International Commission on the Holocaust in Romania which was endorsed by two Romanian heads of state but also with the progress that Romania made in acknowledging its tragic past.”