On the 44th anniversary of the Bologna Massacre, which resulted in 85 fatalities and 200 injuries, the President and the Interior Minister of Italy mark the event.
“With deep feelings of solidarity, forty-four years after the attack, we join the families of the victims and the City of Bologna, the scene of a ruthless neo-fascist subversive strategy nourished by complicities nested in subversive cliques that attempted to attack the freedom conquered by the Italians.
One of the most tragic events in our republican history took place in Bologna.”
This is how Sergio Mattarella remembers the Bologna massacre.
“The dead, the images of the devastated Bologna Station, the ferocious attack on the coexistence of Italians, have left an indelible mark, August 2, 1980, on the identity of the Republic and on the conscience of the Italian people.
“Memory is not only a duty but is the conscious expression of that citizenship expressed in the constitutional values that terrorist violence wanted to strike and destroy.
“One of the most tragic events in our republican history took place in Bologna. An incurable wound, a permanent warning to be delivered to the younger generations together with the values of the democratic response of our homeland, which have allowed redemption and, in the unity of our community, the safeguarding of the common good”, he concludes.
Interior Minister says need to reject fascism
The Minister of the Interior Matteo Piantedosi, in Bologna for the 44th anniversary of the bombing, said there was a need to reject hatred and intolerance.
“We live in a time when the world seems to be facing a threat to the values of freedom and democracy that are the basis of peace and civil coexistence, enshrined in our constitutional charter.
The Bologna massacre reminds us that peace, security and democracy are not taken for granted, but values that must be defended and promoted daily. To do so, we must be united against all forms of hatred and intolerance and forcefully reiterate our rejection of fascism and totalitarianism.”
