The president of the Foundation of Victims of Terrorism, Juan Benito Valenciano, has requested end public tributes to the terrorists and has urged political formations and institutions to honor those who were killed through a Story “Clear, firm and unambiguous” to not allow “horror” to be justified. “Memory saves us and protects us from a second crime, oblivion,” he said in Congress.
The Congress of Deputies has celebrated this Friday the traditional tribute to the victims of terrorism, although without the presence of the main associations as protest for the presence of EH Bildu. The act has been chaired by the president of the Chamber, Francina Armengolwhich has been accompanied by the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska.
On behalf of the victims, Juan Benito Valenciano has pronounced a speech in which he has thanked “deeply” that the Courts keep the commitment to the victims of terrorism alive, since “memory” is a “complex and necessary reality” and a “collective moral demand.”
The three challenges: dignity, repair and education
However, the president of the Foundation recalled that, after the more than 1,450 murders and the decades of suffering for the terrorism of ETA, of jihadism or the Grapo, There are still “open wounds” and pending challenges. “It continues to cost a single truth free of equidistancies,” he said.
Thus, he has urged that the investigation of The more than 300 unsolved attacks because “all victims have the right to truth and fair repair.” In addition, he pointed out that “there can be no differences between victims with conviction and those whose cases have not come to trial.” Since the damage “is the same”, protection and recognition “must also be the same.”
He has also urged the executive, legislative and judicial powers that Tributes to terrorists are ended in public spaces. “The victims do not deserve that humiliation (…) we ask that they be prohibited and sanctioned with forcefulness,” he said.
Finally, he has focused on the importance of educationwhich considers a “social transformation tool” that allows “to look at the past with the truth.” For Valencian, it is necessary that the youngest “know what happened in Spain” so that “it is not repeated and to prevent radicalization and fanaticism. “
“Memory is the prelude to justice, and it is the antidote against the worst of the grievances: oblivion, either in the care, the institutional, the judicial or the social. Keeping memory alive is our obligation with the generations to come. Because only from a clear, firm and unambiguous story, we can prevent the horror of terrorism from being distorted or justified,” he concluded.
Armengol appreciates the work of the associations
This act has been held for 14 years and was established coinciding with the day of the victims of terrorism and also coincides with the anniversary of the girl’s murder Begoña Urroz at the hands of the Grupo Dril in 1960.
He has dedicated a few Armengol words, who has remembered how his death when he had not yet turned two years marked his family’s life with the fear that “at any time that horror would be repeated” and silence.
The president of the Congress has intervened in the tribute to transfer to all families the thanks for “their effort and dedication” so that society “Be a fairer place“:” The representatives of associations and families have been fighting for active memory, for dignity, for the rights of survivors, for the needs of loved ones and for the truth. “
In that sense, memory has claimed as a “fundamental tool for repair” and a “collective” task even though “on many occasions” it has been, as he said, the society itself that has had to “strive to fight against oblivion.” “It is essential to make memory, work to build it, because dignity always goes hand in hand with the truth and It is an obligation of states this search and repair work“He stressed.
The socialist leader has also warned that the world is “increasingly tensioning, unstable and fragmented” and has pointed out terrorism as one of the “greatest threats” for “democratic and free” societies. “It annihilates human rights and our main task today, tomorrow and every day, from institutions, from every corner of this society, is to work to preserve coexistence, peace and freedom,” he concluded.
Minute of silence in the act in memory and tribute to the victims of terrorism Fernando Sánchez / Europa Press
The meeting has begun at 5:30 p.m. with greetings by the president of the Chamber to the representatives of the associations in the Lost Steps Hall, and subsequently, they have passed to the Constitutional Chamber where she has sounded The ephemeral prelude, Interpreted by the student of the Royal Superior Conservatory of Music of Madrid, Ivo Lago Costas. After the speeches, a minute of silence has been kept.
The main associations and Vox are absent
As usual, they have not been present or the main associations, such as the Association Victims of Terrorism (AVT), the group of victims of terrorism (Covite) and Dignity and Justice (DYJ), or Vox.
In the case of associations, they do so to reflect their rejection of the presence of EH Bildu and the government’s pacts with Basque formation, since they are considered the “representatives of ETA in the institutions.” “The best tribute that this government can make to the victims is to break their agreements with Bildu,” says Dyj.
For their part, Vox, as his deputy spokesman has said on Friday in the lower house, José María Figaredo, consider a “masquerade and farce” the tribute and are not willing to “bleach the political heirs of ETA”.
