Mattarella attends Piazza della Loggia bombing anniversary

The bombings took eight lives and injured over one hundred civilians. Photo credit: Cosa Vostra

BRESCIA - Italian President Sergio Mattarella Tuesday visited Piazza della Loggia to mark the 45th anniversary of the Brescia bombing, a terrorist attack that targeted an anti-fascist protest and killed eight people, injuring a further 102 civilians.

 The attack was linked back to Carlo Maria Maggi and Maurizio Tramonte, two members of Ordine Nuovo, a far-right cultural and extra-parliamentary political organisation which has since dissolved. The Piazza della Loggia bombing became a symbol of the Years of Lead in Italy, a period of social and political turmoil marked by political violence.

 Addressing crowds gathered to remember the events as reported by La Repubblica, Mattarella said: “The innocent lives broken that morning of May 28, 1974, the agony of family members, the pain of the wounded, the affront inflicted on Brescia and on the entire national community by murderous terrorists are part of the indelible memory of the Republic.”

 “On this anniversary the feelings of solidarity amongst all Italians are renewed, and with them I wish to express my closeness to those who have suffered most and to those who have contributed over the years to the extraordinary civil and democratic reaction, which caused the subversive strategy [of the bombings] to fail."

 "Through the attack on the anti-fascist demonstration organised by the unions, the terrorists wanted to sow fear and compress political freedoms. A subversive chain linked the Piazza della Loggia massacre to other tragic events of those years [but] democracy was stronger and defeated who wanted to violate it.”

 “Particular gratitude must be expressed to the Association of the Victims’ Families, which has always succeeded in animating active memory, responsible participation, commitment to the truth, even in the most difficult of times,” Mattarella concluded.

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