The head of the Executive, Pedro Sánchez, criticized this Wednesday from Alicante, where the event was held for the day of tribute to the victims of exile, the two parties of PP and Vox who have repealed the regional memory laws, among them , that of the Valencian Community, to replace them with rules or plans called “of concord”. “The anti-memory laws are an attack on international law, an attack against our democracy and the dignity of the victims. History should never be used as a political tactic. We thought that in the year 2024, the Spanish right would have overcome some debates, such as calling a regime like that of dictator Franco a dictatorship,” he declared, alluding to the absence of an express condemnation of the dictatorship in those regulatory texts that PP and Vox They intend to establish where they govern and about which three United Nations rapporteurs have warned in a forceful report that affirms that these plans violate the obligations acquired by Spain in matters of Human Rights. “Defending our memory,” added the President of the Government, “is an obligation derived from our international commitments. Equating victims with executioners is the opposite of harmony. That is why we are going to resort to all the means of the rule of law to protect the democratic memory and the dignity of the victims of Francoism.”
The public, around 500 people gathered at the Casa Mediterráneo in Alicante, gave Sánchez a standing ovation. Previously, the Minister of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, Ángel Víctor Torres, declared: “This democratic Spain in which the children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of those Spaniards live [que tuvieron que huir y exiliarse] It bears little resemblance to the one they left behind, but even today it continues to be harassed by intransigence, lies and hoaxes on the part of the heirs. of those who forced those families into exile. Many supporters of that Spain that Machado portrayed as old and a gambler, a slobster and sad, intend to put our freedoms, advances and democratic conquests in check. But Spain has memory and has law. A law that will continue to be applied throughout the territory despite the existence of regulations that seek to erase memory with the euphemism of concord.” The Government invited both the president of the Valencian Community, Carlos Mazón, and the mayor of Alicante, Luis Barcala. Both from the PP. Both absent at the event.
Sánchez and Torres presented 22 descendants of exiles from Franco’s regime in North Africa with a diploma of recognition. Among them, the granddaughter of Max Aub, the writer of Parisian origin who was in charge of purchasing Picasso’s Gernika and who also had to go into exile; and six relatives of the passengers of the Stanbrook, a ship whose story summarizes all the horror of the Civil War and everything that came after. In 1939, Alicante was the last piece of the Second Republic. Thousands of losers of the war moved there in the hope of fleeing by boat from the clutches of Francoism. The city’s port became a carpet of desperate men and women. They only had the Stanbrookan old English collier who was going to collect oranges, tobacco and saffron and who finally left for Oran (Algeria) with almost 3,000 republicans on board after his captain, Archibald Dickson, in a “heroic, humanitarian and solidarity gesture”, highlighted Sánchez, decided to disobey the orders received and rescue those who, with difficulty, could fit on a freighter prepared only for 24 crew members and a load of oranges, tobacco and saffron.
Helia González, one of the girls who went up to the Stanbrook, He recalled to EL PAÍS in 2009: “The line to board was impressive, there were thousands of people. Hours passed and we feared we would not be able to go up. My father had been on the front, so for us to flee was a matter of life or death. I remember perfectly how, after many hours of waiting, Captain Dickson finally took me in his arms and lifted me onto the ship. As soon as he left, bombs fell. Upon hearing the explosion, the man traveling next to us was so scared that he jumped into the sea. His boot hit my mother when he fell. It was terrible”.
Carmen Arrojo arrived at the port a few hours after the ship set sail. Stanbrook. “At two in the afternoon Franco’s ship arrived. In front of me, a man slit his own neck with a razor. I will never forget that horrible scream of one of his daughters. They had to leave him there. “The girl threw herself down the stairwell as soon as she arrived at the jail.” A report from General Gambara speaks of 66 suicides that day in the port, although another later reduces them to 12. “They pointed at each other, counted to three, and shot,” explained Enrique Cerdán Tato, a writer who has dedicated almost 40 years to study that episode. A half-empty ship, the Maritime, had left Gandía a few hours before. His captain, obedient, had only allowed about 40 political authorities to board.
Eliane Ortega, daughter and granddaughter of Spanish exiles in Algeria, regretted during the event the treatment that “the country of the [lema] liberté, egalité, fraternité [libertad, igualdad y fraternidad, Francia] and how many of those fleeing Franco ended up in Algerian or Moroccan labor and concentration camps. “But from there the defeat of fascism began to be built,” he recalled, before thanking the President of the Government for having decided to “continue.” Sánchez also referred to them. “Today we know that with all of them, Spain would have been a better country. That old English cargo ship had on board men who shortly after fought in the liberation of Paris. “A group of Democrats who never gave up.”
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