Rojales residents could lie in mass grave
AN ASSOCIATION for relatives of victims of the Civil War and dictatorship in Alicante province has asked Rojales town hall for help to trace some local people’s descendants.
Documents they have consulted, including the registry books for Alicante city cemetery, indicate that the remains of nine Rojales residents are in a mass grave where 336 men and 15 women are lying in 41 plots.
The mass grave is currently being excavated as part of a regional government initiative to return victims’ remains to their families.
Nine residents of Rojales were shot at Alicante cemetery between 1939 and 1942, but the remains of two were returned to their families at the time and buried elsewhere.
The association has been looking for relatives of the other seven, and so far the town hall has managed to find five.
“We are missing (relatives of) Vicente Martínez Fernández and Vicente Trives Cárceles, so we are asking for collaboration to be able to contact their families,” said culture councillor Inmaculada Chazarra.
She noted that recovering these remains so that their families can give them a dignified burial is an act of humanity and justice.
“Democracy will only be complete when all citizens have recovered their dignity; this is a historic debt to these families,” said the councillor.
She claimed that this is a way to heal the wounds of their recent past, and noted that Rojales was one of the first municipalities in Spain to change the names of streets and plazas which allude to the Civil War and dictatorship.
This decision was approved by the council back in 1996, when it was led by a Partido Popular (PP) majority.
Stolen baby investigation
The excavation at Alicante cemetery has also discovered a possible case of a stolen baby.
The team of archaeologists found a wooden box with only two fragments of tiles inside but no bones.
According to the team from the specialist company contracted to carry out the dig, ArqueoAntro, the box was the same as those used to bury infants.
The regional government has reported the possible faked burial to a local court for investigation.
“Regrettably we not only found remains of people shot in the post-war and Franco periods, but also evidence of other crimes against humanity, as in this case, of the systematic theft of babies,” said regional councillor for democratic quality Rosa Pérez Garijo.
This discovery was made in part of the cemetery used for burials between 1963 and 1964.
The regional foundation for sanitary and biomedical research (Fisabia) and Valencia university are about to sign a deal to help the regional government using mass sequencing tools.
“Fisabio is at the vanguard of genetic research and its participation will be decisive to making progress in our work to identify victims of Franco’s dictatorship and stolen children,” said Sra Pérez.
WORK on a new water deposit which is being built to ensure the supply to Arenales del Sol and El Altet in Elche is now 80% complete, announced city hall last week.
Located in Arenales, it will increase the storage capacity of the old tank from 1,400 cubic metres to 5,300m3 at a cost of over €1 million, explained mayor Carlos González. He said that the construction is due to be finished at the end of April and it should be up and running in mid-June.
Currently they are sealing the interiors and exteriors, and a green fence will be erected around the perimeter in order to reduce its visual impact on the landscape.
This job is being carried out by the mixed public-private
water company Aigües d’Elx as part of the council’s ongoing plan to improve the municipality’s rural districts.
The council recently spent
€300,000 to improve pavements in El Altet, while the provincial government is due to build a new social centre in the district.