80 years have passed since August 12, 1944, when 560 people, including 130 children, were massacred in Saint Anna of Stazzema by the Nazi SS in collaboration with members of the Republic of Salò. The President of the Republic remembered it, Sergio Mattarella. “For the Republic today is a day of remembrance, of reflection, of testimony – says the Head of State -. On August 12, eighty years ago, Nazi SS units, with fascist complicity, committed one of the most ruthless massacres of the Second World War in the hamlets of Stazzema, mercilessly killing women, the elderly, children, displaced people who thought they had found refuge by escaping the fighting. It was the war brought to the civilian populations, the extermination of innocent local communities. It was the tragedy that struck the villages of the Gothic Line, in Padule di Fucecchio, in Marzabotto, among others. The abyss into which humanity sank then has made these places a European shrine of pain, and a symbol of redemption of that human and civil rebirth that was able to oppose barbarism, generating democracy, freedom, peace, where there was an attempt to erase all hope”.
“To the descendants and people of Stazzema, who today renew the pain of their community for the extermination of their loved ones, goes the moved sentiment of the entire Nation. A great moral legacy – continues Mattarella – has been left by the survivors. The Republic can recognize its roots here. Those that, even today, push us to reject the reasons for war as a tool for resolving disputes”.
“The witness of memory and commitment will continue, as in Sant’Anna di Stazzema, to pass from hand to hand, to remind us – concludes the Head of State – that these are imprescriptible crimes, to accompany us on the path of civilization and peace, defeating those who make hatred grow”.
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– 2024-08-21 11:42:42
