The Government of Spain declares the Argelès-sur-Mer concentration camp in France a Place of Democratic Memory

The Secretary of State for Democratic Memory, Fernando Martínez, and the Mayor of Argelès-sur-Mer, Antoine Parra, at the floral offering at the memorial

The Government of Spain has unveiled in France the plaque declaring the Argelès-sur-Mer concentration camp a Place of Democratic Memory. It also unveiled another inscription at the tomb of the poet Antonio Machado in Colliure.

"European Democratic Memory cannot be understood without the participation of Spaniards in the defence of freedom, something that fills us with pride, and once again recognises the great contribution of Spanish Republican exiles in the democratic reconstruction of Europe after the Second World War", said the Secretary of State for Democratic Memory, Fernando Martínez, who was accompanied by Carmina Gustrán, Commissioner for the celebration of 'Spain in Freedom. 50 years'; by the Consul of Perpignan, Marcelino Cabanas, and the Mayor of Argelès-sur-Mer, Antoine Parra.

The Democratic Memory Act establishes as a Place of Democratic Memory any space, property, site or intangible or intangible cultural heritage in which events have taken place that are of singular importance due to their historical or symbolic significance or their repercussion on collective memory, links to democratic memory, the struggle of Spanish citizens for their rights and freedoms, the memory of women, as well as the repression and violence against the population as a consequence of the resistance to the coup d'état of July 1936, the War, the Dictatorship, exile and the struggle for the recovery and expansion of democratic values.

Accompanied by the mayor of Argelés-sur-Mer, the Secretary of State for Democratic Memory laid a wreath at the memorial commemorating the suffering of the Spanish Republicans interned at this site, which was the first large concentration camp created in France to house exiles who had fled the war and the repression of Franco's army.

Fernando Martínez recalled that "between 1939 and 1940, more than 80,000 Spanish Republicans, military and civilian, were interned in this camp on the beach of Argelès-sur-Mer in very difficult and complicated circumstances. They were Spaniards who fought against fascism in Spain and who, a few months later, fought against Nazism in Europe".

On the other hand, Martínez attended the unveiling of the Place of Democratic Memory plaque next to the tomb of the poet Antonio Machado, who died in Colliure on 22 February 1939, just a few days after being forced to go into exile with his mother and one of his brothers.

The Secretary of State pointed out that "in everyone's memory there was Federico García Lorca and his terrible end, or the imprisonment of Miguel Hernández, but exile was also a great wound for Spanish society and meant an irreparable loss of talent. There were thousands of teachers, intellectuals, architects, mechanics, artists, nurses and poets who, like Antonio Machado, had to leave their homeland in order to save their lives.

Non official translation