Over 30 years ago, citizens of the GDR stormed the Stasi headquarters and thus saved their files from destruction.
Just one year later, the civil rights activist and later Federal President Joachim Gauck took over the office of commissioner for the documents that the Stasi had prepared for tens of thousands of its citizens.
Colloquially, the authority with the 111 kilometers of files quickly became the "Gauck authority".
The Stasi Records Act, which came into force in 1991, clearly stipulated that the federal authorities should at some point transfer their holdings to the federal archive. There were public discussions about it in 2006 and 2007, at that time still under Gauck's successor, the Green politician Marianne Birthler. But the task of working out a concept for the future of the authority together with the President of the Federal Archives, Michael Hollmann, ultimately fell to Birthler's successor, Roland Jahn.
The files should be integrated into the Federal Archives by this summer - as an independent, externally recognizable collection.
The official conclusion is a ceremony this Thursday evening in Berlin, in which Minister of State for Culture Monika Grütters (CDU) and Joachim Gauck also want to take part.
Then the Stasi records authority is officially history.
Files still accessible
Spatially, the Stasi files archive is to remain on the premises of the former Ministry for State Security of the GDR in Berlin-Lichtenberg.
An archive center is planned there, which will guarantee the professional storage of the files and facilitate access for scientists, journalists and private individuals.
Around 50 kilometers of the files are here, the rest is spread across the locations in the eastern federal states.
The Bundestag approved the concept as early as 2019, so that the transfer could begin. At the same time, this ended a long debate about how this archive material should be handled in the future. Members of the Union, SPD, Greens and FDP who introduced the draft law to the Bundestag therefore tried to make it clear that the files would remain accessible.
With the transfer, the office of the Federal Commissioner for the Stasi files will also be abolished.
Roland Jahn's term of office officially ends this Thursday.
Instead, with Evelyn Zupke, there is now a representative for the SED victims, who was elected by the Bundestag last week.
Its central task should be to stand up for the concerns of the victims of the SED dictatorship and to contribute to the appreciation of the victims of communism in Germany.
The site of the authority is to become a place of learning for democracy, which the State of Berlin supported three years ago with a corresponding resolution.
"A bridge to the next generation"
In addition to a lot of approval, the former GDR opposition, who was a member of the Weißenseer Friedenskreis and was active in uncovering systematic election fraud in the GDR, met with a lot of criticism. You don't know enough about the legal issues involved in processing, was one of the allegations. The victims' associations feel that they are not involved enough in the decision. Many remain skeptical about the transfer of the files to the Federal Archives. In the future, there will be a lack of educational work and research that the authority has also done, says Jahn's predecessor, Marianne Birthler.
Jahn himself is certain that the new construct will be “a bridge to the next generation”. In an interview with the Catholic News Agency, he said: “Precisely so that this achievement of the peaceful revolution, access to files, is firmly anchored in society and can be appreciated in the future, we are making the Stasi records archive sustainable and thus securing it that the files remain open. ”The digitization of the documents is a“ very important ”step for the preservation and use, Jahn told the ZDF“ Morgenmagazin ”. This will "secure the future of continuing to use the Stasi documents".