(by Giampaolo Grassi) (ANSA) - ROME, JULY 10 - Behind are the dictatorships of Mussolini and Marshal Tito, there are the sinkholes and the martyrs of anti-fascism, there are the disputed lands, the repressions of minorities, the exiles , identities denied. For this reason too, today's meeting in Trieste between the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella and the Slovenian Head of State Borut Pahor traces a step in history. It is not the first time they have seen each other, but it will be the first time that the highest representative of a nation born from the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia pays homage to the Italian victims of the sinkholes. The gesture will be reciprocated with the transfer, to the Slavic-speaking minority, of the ownership of a symbolic place of Trieste's Slovenian identity, the Narodni Dom, the 'House of the People', which exactly one hundred years ago, on July 13, 1920, was set on fire by the fascists.
The objective of the meeting between Mattarella and Pahor is not to seek an - improbable, impossible - shared memory, but to continue in the work of recognition of mutual suffering, to continue the path of reconciliation.
Overcoming the past, while keeping it in mind, to look ahead in a different perspective. In his years at the Quirinale, Mattarella took many steps in this broad spectrum action, bringing the remains of the Savoys back to Italy or paying homage, in Addis Ababa, to the Ethiopian fallen under the Italian occupation.
The program of the visit to Trieste is marked by ceremonies and signatures that trace the stages of relations, in the past not easy, between the two countries. After the exchange of greetings at Villa Opicina, the first step will be a visit to the Foiba di Basovizza where, it is estimated, two thousand Italian civilians and soldiers were killed. Then Mattarella and Pahor will deposit a crown, with the ribbons of his States, at the stone of Basovizza, inaugurated in September 1945 to remember four young anti-fascists of the Slavic minority sentenced by the Special Court and shot in 1930. There will therefore be the signing of the protocol for the transfer of ownership of the Narodni Dom to a foundation established by associations representing the Slovenian-speaking minority. The ceremony will also be attended by Italian Foreign Ministers Luigi Di Maio, Interni Luciana Lamorgese, and Slovenian Foreign Ministers, Anze Logar, and for 'Slovenians from across the border and in the world' Helena Jaklitsch.
The living symbol of the troubled relationship between the two peoples is the Slovenian writer, naturalized Italian, Boris Pahor, who in his over one hundred years of life has undergone fascist persecution, deportation to Nazi concentration camps and the ban from Tito's Yugoslavia. In a prefecture ceremony, Boris Pahor will receive from the Head of State Mattarella the honor of Knight of the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic, and from President Pahor the Slovenian honor of the Order for exceptional merits. In organizing the day, Quirinale and Prefecture had to deal with anti-covid security rules. In light of the limits for public participation, the visit will be streamed thanks to a service organized by Rai. The day will end with the meeting, at the headquarters of the Region, between Mattarella and the representatives of the exiled associations, the first to pay the bill for a borderland.
