President Meloni’s statement on anniversary of the Fosse Ardeatine massacre

Today, Italy honours the victims of the Fosse Ardeatine massacre. Seventy-nine years ago, 335 Italians were barbarically slaughtered by occupying Nazi troops in retaliation for the Via Rasella attack by partisans in Rome. The massacre marked one of the deepest and most painful wounds ever inflicted on our national community: 335 innocent Italians were killed simply because they were Italian. It is up to all of us – institutions, civil society, schools and the media – to remember those martyrs and to inform especially the younger generations about what happened on that terrible 24 March 1944. Remembrance should never be a mere exercise in style, but rather a civic duty that must be fulfilled every day.

[Courtesy translation]