The Soviet deportations from Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina took place between late 1940 and 1951 and were part of Joseph Stalin's policy of political repression of the potential opposition to the Soviet power (see Population transfer in the Soviet Union). The deported were typically moved to so-called "special settlements" (спецпоселения) (see Involuntary settlements in the Soviet Union). The deportations began after the Soviet occupation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina, which occurred in June 1940. According to a secret Soviet ministry of interior report dated December 1965, 46,000 people were deported from Moldavia for the period 1940—1953.  Read more..

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Only one year after the annexation of Bessarabia (a region that included the current Republic of Moldova) and northern Bukovina by the Soviet troops, to the detriment of Romania, a first wave of mass deportation of Romanian and Moldovan began in the night of June 12 to 13, 1941. This annexation was the result of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact signed in 1939 between Hitler's Germany and the USSR which then divided Europe into "spheres of influence". . Read more..