Rome, 25 April. (Adnkronos) – “Without memory, there is no future”. Thus the President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, on the occasion of April 25th, celebrating the anniversary of the Liberation in Civitella in Val di Chiana, in Tuscany, where in 1944 the Nazis massacred 244 people. “I add – using words pronounced by Aldo Moro in 1975 – that ‘around anti-fascism popular unity is possible and necessary, without compromising on the other hand the variety and richness of the national community, social and political pluralism, free and changing articulation of majorities and minorities in the democratic game,'” the head of state said.
“The infamy of the Marzabotto massacre, the largest committed in Italy, was followed by an equally unworthy corollary: fascist propaganda, in newspapers subjected to controls and censorship, denied the undeniable, trying to deny what had happened, trying to define false the news of the massacre and mocking the witnesses. It is necessary – today and in the future – to remember those massacres and those victims and the national and regional initiatives that support it are precious. Without memory, there is no future”.
“With these barbaric killings, in their strategy of death, the Nazi-fascists tried to create scorched earth around the partisans to protect the German retreat, to establish a regime of terror against civilians so that they would not join the partisans, to carry out revenge against of a people, considered inferior as an ally and, after the armistice, traitors. These were very serious war crimes, contrary to any international rule and military honor and, even more so, to the principles of humanity”, he stated.
“No reason, military or of any other kind, can in fact be invoked to justify the killing of hostages and defenseless prisoners. The Nazi-fascists – the head of state recalled – were well aware of this: the bodies of the fighting partisans, captured, tortured, killed, they had to remain exposed for days, as a sinister warning to the population. But they tried to keep the massacres of civilians hidden and hidden, the victims buried or burned, we know whether out of an intimate sense of shame and dishonor to incur the rigors of future justice, or, again, to avoid arousing further feelings of revolt among Italians”.
“A long trail of blood accompanied Italy’s journey towards Liberation – underlined the Head of State – The blood of the martyrs who paid with their lives the terrible consequences of an unjust and unfortunate war, fought alongside of Hitler in the belief that the greatness and influence of Italy would unfold in a new world order. An order founded on the domination of the race, on the oppression or even extermination of other peoples. A brute, ignoble aspiration, but also vain. Totally submitted to Hitler’s imperialist Germany, fascist Italy, which entered the conflict without any respect for the soldiers cynically sent to die, would still have had no escape. Luigi Salvatorelli precisely noted: ‘With defeat it would have lost much, with victory everything…'” .
“Generations of young Italians, educated since childhood in the unfortunate cult of war and blind and absolute obedience, had been sent, in the name of a claimed national superiority, to attack neighboring nations with weapons: the homelands of others ‘ as Don Lorenzo Milani called them – Mattarella continued – In the disastrous retreat of Russia, on the fields of El Alamein, in the brutal repression carried out in Greece, in the Balkans, in Ethiopia, in the deportations of the Jews to the extermination camps, in the support to the Nazis in the repression of the civilian population, the rupture between the Italian people and fascism occurred – Salvatorelli wrote – ‘a profound moral crisis, a complete disaffection with the regime, a disastrous collapse of the idol Mussolini’ fascism had in reality, some time ago, discovered its face, revealing its true brutal and inhuman traits”.
In the morning Mattarella accompanied by the presidents of the Senate, Ignazio La Russa, of the Chamber Lorenzo Fontana, of the Meloni Council, of the Constitutional Court Augusto Barbera, by the Minister of Defense Guido Crosetto, and by high military officials, paid homage to the Altare della Patria, placing a laurel wreath on the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, on the occasion of Liberation Day.
“On the day in which Italy celebrates the Liberation, which with the end of fascism laid the foundations for the return of democracy, we reiterate our aversion to all totalitarian and authoritarian regimes. Those of yesterday, which oppressed the peoples of Europe and in the world, and those of today, which we are determined to oppose with commitment and courage”. The Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, wrote it on Instagram. “We will continue to work – she adds – to defend democracy and for an Italy finally capable of uniting on the value of freedom. Long live freedom!”.
“I have always honored April 25th without having to flaunt it and without politicizing it”. These are the words of the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Infrastructure Matteo Salvini arriving at the Shrine of the Fallen in Milan for the laying of laurel wreaths on the occasion of the celebrations for Liberation Day together with the Mayor of Milan Giuseppe Sala and the Minister of Education and of Merit Giuseppe Valditara.
“I didn’t say that I would come here until the end to avoid there being those who, instead of celebrating the past so that it doesn’t return, go around creating problems,” he explained. After all, “this morning from Rome I saw some shameful, scandalous images of the attack on the Jewish Brigade. Here – he concluded – I hope that in a day too far away, April 25th will be a day of national unity”.
“This is a government chosen by the citizens. Then anti-fascism yes, it seems obvious to me”, he added, underlining: “But then does anyone have nostalgia for fascism? I hope not”.
“April 25th is the day of Liberation and of the entire Republic, the day in which we remember those who gave their lives and with so much sacrifice built the foundations for democracy and freedom of this country and for the defense of values of our Constitution.” Thus the secretary of the Democratic Party Elly Schlein arriving at the Milanese procession for the celebrations of April 25th. “This – adds Schlein – is a day in which the commitment to the fight for the defense of our Constitution and for its full implementation must be renewed. This is why we must remember the Resistance that freed us from the Nazi-fascists.”
