Talk:Vilnius Declaration

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"Notability" of a single sentence in a 65 page document[edit]

The Vilnius Declaration contains over 20 resolutions, each with many articles, and there was/is no justification for highlighting a single article as "notable". The misleading impression was given that the Vilnius Declaration was mainly about europewide agreement on the equivalence of Stalin and Hitler's crimes, whereas in actual fact the Vilnius Declaration reaffirms the uniqueness of the Holocaust (RESOLUTION ON DIVIDED EUROPE REUNITED: PROMOTING HUMAN RIGHTS AND CIVIL LIBERTIES IN THE OSCE REGION IN THE 21st CENTURY - Article 3) http://www.oscepa.org/images/stories/documents/activities/1.Annual%20Session/2009_Vilnius/Final_Vilnius_Declaration_ENG.pdf Spitfire3000 (talk) 17:24, 27 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Articles are not supposed to be mere summaries of primary sources (like this declaration). Some issues are more relevant than other issues. In this case, the resolution on stalinism was widely reported by the media[1] and provoked a reaction from Russia[2]. To my knowledge, no other issues voted on were reported on by the media in a similar manner or provoked any such reactions. If you feel other material from the declaration needs to be described, then find secondary sources reporting on it and include it in the article. Wikipedia editors don't decide which issues that are most notable, the sources do. When the BBC and other media highlights a resolution from the declaration, it becomes notable. Tataral (talk) 09:59, 30 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The danger here (and in other places on wikipedia) is that the Vilnius Declaration appears to be ABOUT Stalinism, which it isn't. This is misleading, suggesting the OSCE prioritised that single article and consider it one of the main purposes of the Declaration. This is clearly not true. The article is a very very small part of the Declaration and the Declaration should not be characterised as a Declaration on Stalinism. The fact that one article was controversial and provoked reaction in the press should not mean that the wikipedia page should be 99% about a single article. Or do I misunderstand Wikipedia policies? I am sure you perfectly understand that this one article in a 65-page declaration is being used to lend weight to something which has very little weight in the context of the whole Declaration. There are political reasons for amplifying the importance of that article, and I think we can agree that this article would not be amplified by someone with a neutral point of view? If the only secondary reference is about this one article, then surely the page should be rewritten to inform the reader that there are 64 other pages in the Vilnius Declaration which have nothing to do with Stalin. The Prague Declaration page makes the scope of the entire declaration clear, but the Vilnius Declaration page conveniently (for those of a particular political opinion) gives the impression that the OSCE had a meeting about Stalinism and produced a declaration predominantly about this issue. What would you suggest to redress this imbalance?Spitfire3000 (talk) 10:52, 30 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I have written a short article on a declaration based on the press coverage of its most notable (to my knowledge) resolution, which addressed a topic I'm interested in. If you are interested in other topics addressed by the declaration and able to find sources that demonstrate the notability of these issues, then feel free to expand the article. When I have been looking for material on this declaration, I didn't find much in secondary sources on other topics than the condemnation of stalinism, which appears to be a very significant, noteworthy issue. Tataral (talk) 11:00, 30 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]