Greeks in Uzbekistan: Newspaper and Memories of Greek Communist Political Refugees in Tashkent

This thesis investigates the experience and memory of Greek communist political refugees in Tashkent following their defeat in the Greek Civil War in September 1949. It examines two interconnected dimensions: the official discourse of Greek-language newspapers and personal narratives in post-repatriation memoirs. The first part analyzes Pros ti Niki (1950–1956) and Neos Dromos (1956–1983) as instruments of ideological formation under the dual authority of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). The 1956 shift in title and tone reflects the internal KKE crisis and Soviet de-Stalinization. The second part turns to memoirs published primarily after 1974, following the fall of the Greek military junta and the gradual repatriation of political refugees. These autobiographical texts offer multiple perspectives on exile that span from affirmation of the revolutionary mission to critical examination of Soviet realities and Party authoritarianism. Comparing the monolithic press discourse with these diverse recollections reveals how collective memory fractured along ideological and factional lines. Methodologically, the thesis integrates historical analysis, discourse analysis, and memory studies, situating Tashkent exile within Cold War dynamics and Soviet nationality policies. This research illuminates a neglected chapter of Greek and Soviet post-war history, examining how official discourse shaped everyday life and how memory was reconfigured in post-authoritarian Greece. The thesis argues that exile was neither univocally heroic nor uniformly traumatic, but contested terrain whose meaning shifted with political positioning and historical context. Keywords: Greek political refugees, Tashkent, exile press, KKE, de-Stalinization, collective memory, Greek Civil War, Cold War