The President of the Republic called this Saturday to mobilize citizens against all forms of racism, anti-Semitism, discrimination, xenophobia and homophobia, stressing that hate speech against ethnic or religious minorities has not disappeared.
Marcelo Rebelo de Souza left this appeal in a written appeal published on the official website of the President of the Republic on the Internet on the occasion of International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
“On this day, joining the United Nations to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the President of the Republic pays tribute to the victims of crimes against humanity committed during the Second World War, recalling that incitement to hatred against ethnic minorities or religious beliefs has not disappeared from our society,” the text says.
The head of state “therefore reinforces the warning that we do not demobilize the fight against all forms of racism, anti-Semitism, discrimination, xenophobia and homophobia, as well as the fight for human solidarity and brotherhood, yesterday as we do today.”
The message comes as far-right groups call for an online demonstration under the slogan “Against the Islamization of Europe” on February 3 in the Martim Moniz district of Lisbon, where immigrants are concentrated.
In this text, the President of the Republic remembers the Portuguese diplomat Aristides de Sousa Mendes (1885-1954) as “an example of courage, altruism and solidarity” in the year that seven decades have passed since his death, and believes that “he must continue to inspire the Portuguese.
As consul general in Bordeaux, France, Aristide de Sousa Mendes saved thousands of Jews and other refugees from the Nazi regime in 1940 by issuing visas against orders from the government of António de Oliveira Salazar, for which he was expelled from his diplomatic career. and will ultimately die in poverty.
In January 2020, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa represented Portugal at the 5th World Holocaust Forum in Jerusalem, where he expressed the “solidarity of the Portuguese people for the six million victims” of the Nazi genocide.
“We have not forgotten, this cannot happen again,” he said then.
In Israel, the President of the Republic had the opportunity to meet with Holocaust survivors.
IEL // JPS
Lusa/The End