On Monday, the patriarchal auxiliary bishop Varlaam of Ploiesti officiated a memorial service at the patriarchal cathedral in Bucharest in honour of the founders of the Union of Bessarabia with the Kingdom of Romania.
Bishop Varlaam recalled that “today we mark 105 years since the members of the Country’s Council in Chisinau voted the Union of Bessarabia with its motherland Romania. It was the first lost Romanian province that voted for the union with the motherland in a difficult time for Romania.”
The patriarchal auxiliary bishop explained the historical context in which Romania and Bessarabia were at the time of unification.
He also evoked the personalities involved in the union of March 1918, such as Alexei Mateevici, Elena Aristarh Romanescu and Metropolitan Gurie Grosu.
“The union of Bessarabia with the mother country opened the series of blessed events of 1918 through which other Romanian provinces were integrated into Romania,” Bp Varlaam noted.
The historical event that occurred on March 27, 1918, was the return of the Bessarabia territory between the Prut and the Dniester to its mother country, Romania. The first province to join with Romania to become Greater Romania was Bessarabia.
The Paris Peace Conference of 1920 recognized the legitimacy of Bessarabia’s union with Romania. On October 28, 1920, Romania signed the Treaty of Paris with Great Britain, France, Italy and Japan. The parties recognized Romania’s sovereignty over the territory of Bessarabia.
The effects of the union were cancelled after 22 years in 1940. Then, based on the secret Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact, Soviet Russia annexed Bessarabia, northern Bukovina and Herta region.
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Photography courtesy of Basilica.ro / Raluca-Emanuela Ene
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