Dear comrades:
A few minutes ago, we had the opportunity to participate in the event organized to commemorate the 78th anniversary of the liberation of the Mauthausen Concentration Camp. Now we are gathered here in front of the plaque that commemorates the 5 Cubans who, according to the records, suffered the atrocities that were committed in this place.
These Cubans, who after fighting on the side of the Spanish Republic, as part of the internationalist contingent during the Civil War, were captured in occupied France by the Nazi-fascist hordes and confined as stateless persons here, in Mauthausen.
Although all the concentration camps established by the Nazi regime had the same objectives, the Mauthausen-Gusen network was one of those that most evidenced the criminal character of the ideology defended by that regime. Tortures, alleged medical experiments with prisoners, lack of food, diseases, executions, among many other abuses were suffered by almost 200,000 people from more than 40 countries who passed through its facilities. Even more horrendous was the use of the gas chambers to mass murder the prisoners and then cremate them.
Those who were held in this place knew that they had no chance of getting out of here, let alone surviving.
Comrades:
Before coming to this event, we had the opportunity to read and listen to the stories of those who survived this horrific experience. Our hearts are touched when we hear their stories.
Being able to be here and observe first-hand the conditions in which they lived, makes us reflect on the alarming proliferation in many parts of the world of various extremist political parties, movements and groups, including neo-Nazi and skinhead groups, and similar extremist ideological movements, which has resulted in an increasing number of racially motivated acts of violence and incitement to hatred in the public sphere.
Its persistence is manifested in the incessant formation of associations and political parties with a racist agenda; the construction of monuments and the organization of public demonstrations to glorify the Nazi past and neo-Nazism; attempts to desecrate or destroy monuments in memory of those who fought against Nazism; the social exclusion and marginalization of peoples, ethnicities, minorities and other social groups and categories of people; the proliferation of discriminatory and xenophobic migration policies and laws, among others.
Dear Friends:
We strongly believe that the persistence and resurgence of neo-Nazism, neo-fascism and other violent nationalist ideologies based on racial or national prejudice must be condemned at the international level and cannot be justified using manipulative and selective arguments.
It is our duty not to forget what happened here.
It is also our duty to pay tribute to Roberto Cortezón Martínez, Félix Llanos Alonso, Alberto Sánchez Martínez, José Luis Pérez Arocha and Manuel Sola Castillo, Cubans who, for their ideas and internationalism, perished in this horrendous place. Eternal glory to them!
Let us commit ourselves to fight so that never again will the world have to live horrors like those committed in Mauthausen!
Let us all unite to say “never again” to fascism!
A better world is possible!
Thank you very much.
(Embacuba Austria/Cubaminrex)